Faith, Part II: Forgiveness
by Gabrielle Lawson
Summary: Second part of Faith trilogy: Dr. Bashir returns to DS9 after being marooned for six months and hopes to regain the life he had.
1. Chapter Six

**Star Trek: Deep Space Nine**

**Faith, Part II: Forgiveness**

By Gabrielle Lawson

* * *

Disclaimer: Paramount and Viacom own all things Trek, including DS9, the main characters thereof, the _Defiant_, etc. I only borrow their characters and settings. The stories are mine. Do not copy without including this disclaimer and my name. Do not post without permission.

Author's Note: This story does reference other stories of mine. It can stand alone but it might leave you with questions. However, if you haven't read Faith, Part I, it will leave you completely baffled. That story can be found on my own web site as well as here.

Also note: This story begins at Chapter 6. Chapters 1-5 belong to the previous story, Hope. Chapters 11 and on will belong to the next story, Peace.

Acknowledgements: Thank you to my beta readers. I've added a few more over the more than a year that it took to write this. It's been a quiet year in beta reader land, but the story got finished and help came when I needed it. Thanks to all the members of the Writer's Circle and Darrel Beach, too.

**Chapter Six**

At once it was familiar and unsettling. It wasn't so different from when he and Captain Sisko had returned from Adigeon Prime. The bay was full of people. Some were there to meet friends and family from the crew of the _Enterprise_, talking in little groups as they funneled toward the exit. But many were there for him, and, regardless of their reason for being there, everyone in the bay stopped to stare at him.

But that time after Adigeon Prime was different. He was happy then, happy to be recovered, to be home. Now happy was a foreign thing, something other people--blissfully unaware other people--felt. What he felt this time was that same energy pricking at the back of his neck.

_This is what I wanted_, he told himself, hoping he could rationalize the pricks away. His friends were there: O'Brien, Kira and Odo, Worf, Jake and Nog, Ezri. Jabara, Reyna, Doctor Girani, and several other medical personnel. They smiled, but they also hesitated. Some lifted their hands to clap but resisted when the senior staff didn't raise theirs.

Garak was there, too, hanging back by the exit where Quark was greeting new arrivals who'd lost interest in the homecoming. Garak wasn't smiling like the others. He nodded a greeting and then stepped through the door.

Kira stepped forward first and wrapped him in a hug. "Welcome home. It's good to see you again."

Bashir raised one arm to hold her, and he had to admit that he liked how he felt just then. Like he was home. "It's good to be seen."

Others came forward to welcome him, one by one, and Bashir almost forgot why he'd been away and how long. This was no different from the trip back from Adigeon. He was home and Riker's warning was unnecessary. He could have his life back. It would be as if the last six months hadn't happened, except that he wouldn't have to fear abduction by Section 31.

Shaking hands and accepting hugs, Bashir worked his way toward the exit. It was a bit overwhelming, seeing each of these people again, shaking hands, accepting an embrace. Memories flooded in with each one, and he didn't see who was next until he or she was standing in front of him.

Dax held him a long time. Worf simply shook his hand. Chief O'Brien stood by and smiled as his family did the hugging. Jake seemed even taller than before.

"It's good to see you again, Doctor."

Then the room seemed to spin, and all the sound rushed out the slowly closing airlock door. Sisko. He'd forgotten about Sisko. It was hard to breathe. "Thank you, sir," Bashir choked out, hoping he didn't sound as insincere as Sisko had. It was all upside down now. This was the Sisko the war had made. The life Bashir wanted didn't include him.

More people stepped up to greet him, and Bashir smiled back, shook a hand, accepted a hug. But he wasn't fooled by it anymore. The life he'd had was a fantasy. Time moved forward not back. Sisko could never be the captain he had been, and Bashir knew he could never have the faith he'd once had.

He finally reached the door. He wanted to get away from all of them now, but he wasn't sure how he'd manage it.

"Can I carry that for you, sir?" It was Nog who asked, and he was already reaching for Bashir's bag.

Bashir snapped the bag away, realizing too late that he'd been too harsh. "No," he said, trying to sound normal, unafraid. That bag held his life. "But you can tell me where my quarters are."

"Right where you left them, sir," Nog replied. "You should know, sir, that there is a party prepared, if you feel up to it."

Party. Of course there would be a party. But this one room had been enough. His skin itched from all the energy, the people. His ears rang with all the voices. He missed the quiet of his quarters on the _Enterprise_.

"I don't think I do," he told Nog. "I just want to go home."

"I understand." Nog tapped his leg once to show he could empathize. "But just remember, you are home now, and we're all pretty happy about it."

"That's nice to hear," Bashir admitted. "I need to go now," he whispered to the Ferengi. "Do you think you can run interference for me, give me some time to settle in before everyone comes to my door."

"You've got it, sir," Nog replied. "If you find the time you should go see Vic. He was pretty broken up when you were--when they said. . . ."

"I'll do that," Julian promised. "Soon." And he escaped out the door before anyone else could stop him.

The corridor was clear since the visitors had already made their way into the station and many of the greeters were still in the airlock. Bashir dashed for a turbolift before any others could make their way out after him.

He called out the deck and tried to feel at home again in the familiar movement of the turbolift. It wasn't as smooth as those aboard the _Enterprise_. It was darker, like the station. He found that comforting.

The turbolift jerked to a stop, and Bashir held his breath as the door opened. But no one was there. He stepped out into the corridor, his corridor. He remembered it, but it didn't feel like it did before. Riker's admonishment about changing puzzles and pieces that didn't fit came to mind, but he pushed it away. He'd make it fit. He'd make it fit. This wasn't so much like six months ago. It was more like the time he'd first arrived, his first week on the station. The corridor was familiar and foreign at the same time. In a week or two, it would only be familiar.

He found his quarters and braced himself for the same reaction of familiar and foreign. He opened the door, expecting to see little beyond the furniture. Instead he saw Kukalaka smiling at him from the table in the corner. His paintings hung on the walls. He went into the bedroom and found clothes in the closet, his clothes. Not all of them, but his nonetheless. He _was_ home.

* * *

"Well, that was quick," Jake commented quietly.

Captain Sisko heard him though. "Probably too many people." He wasn't surprised. The Bashir he'd met on the _Enterprise_ didn't seem the type for crowds.

He'd watched Bashir as he was welcomed back. He'd seemed hesitant coming out of the airlock, and, though he smiled, shook hands, and hugged those who greeted him, he'd seemed distant, maybe even sad. He seemed more to match Troi's and O'Brien's description than the memories of Sisko's own encounter with him.

Until it was Sisko's turn. Bashir had frozen for an instant, even stumbled a bit. He'd looked pale and off-balance. There was something in his expression and Sisko couldn't decide if it was fear or distrust. He'd made his way to the door rather quickly after that.

"It's probably quite a story," Jake decided, "if he'll ever tell it."

"Just don't push him, Jake," Sisko warned. There were some things in that story which Sisko hoped Jake would never learn.

"I wouldn't," Jake assured him.

Dax walked up to them. "It went better than I expected, actually," she said. "He seemed a bit bewildered but otherwise not overly traumatized. I can understand him wanting to get out of the crowd. We should probably leave him alone for awhile." She pulled the captain away from Jake, and he knew she was talking now in an official capacity. "I'll go see him tomorrow morning. I'll be seeing him every day in the beginning. We should discuss a duty schedule."

Sisko didn't feel right about having Bashir on any duty roster, but he knew he'd been on light duty with the _Enterprise_ and had managed just fine according to Doctor Crusher. Still, he didn't want to commit right away. "Let's wait until after you meet with him to decide," he suggested. "Give him some time to settle in."

* * *

Bashir had thought maybe he'd be able to sleep now that he was back in his own bed, but sleep just wouldn't come. He felt uneasy, restless. He couldn't keep his eyes closed. Instead he kept glancing toward the foot of the bed, waiting to see Sloan the in the chair there. But it was empty.

He tried staring at the ceiling, hoping boredom would help him fall asleep. But after an hour he was still awake and the ceiling appeared to move just a bit.

Bashir sat up and threw his legs over the side of the bed. He stood up and called for lights. He knew the ceiling was more likely his imagination than a changeling, but it had unnerved him just the same. It was no use. He wouldn't sleep tonight.

No one had come to see him since he'd checked into his quarters, but he had a few messages. At first he had been thankful, but now he wanted the company. It was too late, though. Miles would be asleep. Dax, too. Kira was probably with Odo. Even Quark's was closed by now. There was no one to see.

Bashir sat down in the middle of the living area of his quarters and tried his old game. He started with the wall by the door. But he'd already done it. Thousands of times. His quarters was the first thing he'd taken apart in the cave. He'd branched out from there. It only took him a few minutes to dismantle the wall now.

Disgusted, he stood and went back to the bedroom just long enough to grab some clothes. He changed in the living room. Maybe no one was up and maybe everything was closed but he could still take a walk. It was something.

He glanced both ways down the corridor before stepping into it. He found it a little disturbing seeing the station so empty. It wasn't what he remembered. Except for a few times. Like that time the ion storm had caused an evacuation of all but the senior staff and Verad had hijacked Jadzia's symbiont. Or the time his academy roommate was running around killing people a few years ago. He'd nearly died that time.

He tried not to think about that as he got in the turbolift. He wasn't even sure where to go at first. He finally decided on the Promenade. He wanted to see it, even if it was closed.

The turbolift let him out on the upper level and he was glad for that. The Infirmary was not far away, and, though quiet, it was open. He didn't want to face anyone just yet. At least not anyone who would ask questions. He walked away from the Infirmary and descended the stairs.

The shops, for the most part, were as he remembered them, except that they were closed and dark. A few had changed names and probably owners, but not many. Garak's had different clothes in the windows, and he could see a light inside. But he didn't know if he was ready to face him yet knowing what he knew.

He spent an hour walking the eerily quiet Promenade. He still wasn't sleepy. He took the next turbolift before the Infirmary and decided to go down. He couldn't really go up. The night shift would be manning Ops. Maybe he could find some place he hadn't yet dismantled.

He chose one of the lower decks nearer Reactor Four. That reactor had never been repaired enough to be of any use to the station after the Cardassian Withdrawal. The decks down there were deserted almost all the way up to the Promenade. There were only a handful of fully utilized decks below the Promenade. At least that was the case six months ago. He hoped it was still so now.

He wasn't disappointed. The area he ended up in was so deserted that it didn't even have working lights. He didn't mind that too much though. He was still on familiar terms with darkness, and he doubted anyone looking for him would even consider searching for him in the lower decks. Still he listened carefully for footsteps or anything out of the ordinary as he walked.

He used his hands to feel the walls and any structures there. Mostly he found ordinary walls, just like the ones he'd dismantled so many times before. But he did find some new things farther down, closer to the core.

The power transfer conduits were different down there, bigger. The replicators seemed older, of a different model, perhaps, than those on the upper decks. What quarters and supply rooms there were were stripped bare. No beds or bunks or furniture of any kind. There were a few computer consoles, especially in the reactor room. Those had never been upgraded, never integrated with Starfleet systems.

It would take some research, but it was the kind of challenge he was hoping for. Tomorrow he'd do some reading, find some diagrams. But tonight, while he was down there, and since there was no power to activate even a light, he decided to employ a hands-on approach.

Bashir started with the power transfer conduit since it was the least complicated. He pulled off the cover and began to gently feel his way around the nodes and cables. By morning, he could have drawn a diagram of his own.

He knew it was morning because of the change in power drawn by the station. He could feel it vibrate in the walls and deckplates. Everything that slept at night was coming to life again. He lifted himself from the floor and stretched out his aching muscles. He'd fallen asleep.

It was still dark and for a moment he was disoriented. It was only a moment. Realizing that someone was sure to come by his quarters for a visit, most likely Dax, he headed back out the way he'd come. It was faster this time, since he'd memorized the layout on his way down.

It was still early when he emerged on the Promenade. Shops were just beginning to open. Only a few customers bothered to beat the morning crowds by being out at this hour. No one even noticed him. Bashir skirted around the Infirmary, but noted the light still shining softly in Garak's shop. As he entered the turbolift, Bashir rubbed his face and was thankful he'd have the time to shave before Dax came by.

Starfleet, however, got an early start on the day, and the quarters on his deck were beginning to spill out their inhabitants. A few people waved hello as they passed, but for the most part, Bashir got home without too much of a fuss.

After he'd showered and shaved, he went to the closet to find a change of clothes. Then he realized he didn't know what to wear. He'd been given a duty shift on the _Enterprise_ so a uniform was appropriate there. But he had to start again here. If they didn't allow him back to duty right away, he should stick to civilian attire.

He decided on the uniform. His time on the _Enterprise_ would probably be taken into consideration. He'd be given light duty at the start. He was concerned, though, that his post of Chief Medical Officer would now belong to someone else. He'd try asking Dax about that when she came.

The door chimed just as he finished his breakfast. "Come in, Dax," he called.

The door opened and Ezri walked in with a inquisitive smile. "How did you know it was me?"

Bashir put his plate in the replicator and gave her a light grin. "Forgive me if I sound Vulcan, but it was a logical assumption. You need to evaluate me before I can go back to duty."

Her smile faded just a bit. "And I just want to make sure you're okay."

"Of course," Bashir agreed. "Would you rather we meet in your office?"

"Not if you're more comfortable here," she answered.

"To be honest," Bashir replied, deciding openness in some areas might keep her from prodding too deeply into others, "I don't feel all that comfortable here. It's like I don't belong anymore."

"You belong, Julian," she reassured him quickly. "It will just take some getting used to."

Bashir shook his head, but offered her a seat on the couch. "I don't mean on the station," he clarified. "I mean here, in my quarters."

She relaxed a bit at that. "Do you know why that is?"

Bashir pulled one of the chairs from the table over to the coffee table. "Yes. I think it's because I was twice abducted from here," he said, not raising his voice, "because on at least three occasions I awoke to find Sloan sitting in the chair at the foot of my bed, and because for a month, a changeling lived here while impersonating me. And because for six months, I lived in a cave."

Ezri nodded. "Those are valid reasons. Would you like your quarters changed?"

Bashir thought about that. Would it help? He was sure Sloan could find him whereever he went. The Dominion, too, if they were so inclined. "No," he said finally, "I think it will get better in time and feel more like home again. Another place wouldn't make much of a difference. This is what I remember."

"If you change your mind," she offered, "just let me know." She consulted a PADD she had brought with her. "Doctor Crusher had quite a few nice things to say about you. Did you enjoy your time on the _Enterprise_?"

Bashir gave that some thought. "Some of it," he decided. "Not the brig, not the battle, and not the away mission."

"I read your report about Carello Neru," she said. "And Riker's. I'm sorry you had to see something like that."

Bashir shrugged. "Someone had to. We might not have found the transmitter any other way. We wouldn't have known what happened to the colonists."

"You wouldn't have found the changeling," Ezri added.

Bashir shook his head. "I'm sure the changeling would have found us. He probably wanted to be rescued, so that when we figured out the solution to the dilithium, he could take it from us."

"Well, it's good to see you can still find the bright side of such situations." Ezri smiled, but Bashir thought it seemed forced. He didn't take any offense in it, however. She was in her counselor role.

And, though there were places he didn't want to go, he didn't intend on making her job harder. She was only trying to help, and he realized that even as he thought it impossible. "It's more being realistic," he told her, "or seeing the practical in a given situation. There's really nothing bright in falling down a turbolift shaft into a roomful of rotting corpses."

She surprised him then. Her smile was genuine. "That's better."

Bashir was honestly puzzled. "Better how?"

She reached a hand out to touch his knee. "I'd be more worried if you thought everything was okay with that, if everything was just rosy."

He wasn't sure what to do with that. He stood and walked to the table, keeping his back to her. "Nothing's rosy," he said quietly. He hadn't meant to say it out loud.

"Oh, I don't know," she replied, walking up behind him. "Some things are. I thought I'd lost someone I cared about, but he came back last night."

_Mixed bag_, he thought, just like he'd told Data. Good and bad mixed up together. "That's one way to look at it."

"What's the other way?" she asked, turning him around to face her.

"That I've been gone too long," he replied, voicing his fear, the one he'd had after his talk with Riker. "That everything has changed around me and maybe I won't fit anymore."

She nodded. "That's understandable. Things have changed. People have grown older, some have died, new people have come. The circumstances of the war. But you can still fit."

He wanted to believe her. "How can you be sure?"

Her smiled brightened. "Because we left you a spot."

He didn't understand. They'd thought he was dead.

"Go report to Kira," she told him. "Let her tell you."

She walked back to the couch and picked up her PADD. "I'm going to clear you for light duty, like on the _Enterprise_. Just let Kira know when you're ready to start. It doesn't have to be right away."

"Thank you," was all he could think to say.

She smiled that slightly off-kilter smile she had. "You're welcome. I'll see you tomorrow. After lunch?"

He nodded. "That's fine."

"My office then," she said as she headed for the door. "Have a good day, Julian."

Bashir didn't think he'd ever heard that salutation spoken as sincerely as that.

* * *

Kira was glad when she got the communique from Ezri. Julian could go back to work. He would be up soon. Kira briefed one of the other Ops officers and cleared her work station. She wanted to talk to him in private.

Everyone looked up when the turbolift brought him to Ops. They offered greetings, welcoming him back, but no one left their workstations. Kira offered him a smile as he approached her. He looked well, though perhaps tired and a little wary. She understood that. She probably looked like that during the Occupation.

"Ezri said I should see you," he said. "To report for duty."

Kira didn't drop her smile. "Let's take a walk and discuss it."

He didn't share her smile. "Shouldn't I be talking to the Chief Medical Officer?"

Kira brightened. "That's what we need to discuss." She took his arm and steered him back to the turbolift. She decided on the Ward Room. Captain Sisko would need it later for a meeting with Admiral Ross, but that wasn't until this afternoon.

"Have a seat," she said, pulling out a chair. She sat in the one next to it. "It is so good to see you," she said again. She couldn't help it. He was the first of all those she had lost who had come back.

His brow was furrowed and he got straight to the point. "Ezri said there was a place for me, a place left for me. She also said I should talk to you."

Kira's smile brightened. "You can't talk to the Chief Medical Officer because there isn't one."

His eyes widened and that one vein in the middle of his forehead became more pronounced. "What? How can you not have a Chief Medical Officer? Someone has to be responsible for the health and wellbeing--"

Kira raised a hand. "We've had six." That stopped him. "Bajoran doctors, rotating schedules."

He was still indignant, though his tone had calmed. "Rotating?"

Kira nodded. "Monthly."

His eyes widened again. "Colonel, you can't just swap out doctors once a month. A Chief Medical Officer needs to know his post, his staff, his environment. He has to have the trust of his patients. It takes months to bring all that together and become an effective administrator and physician. You can't just start over once a month."

"I realize that," she replied, letting him rant. She had known he'd react that way. She'd missed that passion. "That's why Doctor Girani offered to be Assistant Chief Medical Officer the whole time, to provide stability."

"Then why not appoint her to the post?" he asked. "She's a fine doctor, and a Bajoran one at that."

"It has nothing to do with her being Bajoran," Kira told him. "And she was content where she was. No one in your staff wanted the post. They felt they couldn't fill your shoes."

He was still confused. She could tell by the brows, the vein, the way he gestured when he spoke. "If it wasn't about being Bajoran, why not have Starfleet send a replacement?"

Kira was quick to answer. "Because I wanted them to think it was about being Bajoran. I told Captain Sisko that this was a Bajoran station and that Bajorans should have more representation in the senior staff. Then I said the rotation was a way to give the Bajoran doctors an opportunity to treat many different species where'd they'd mostly treated only Bajorans before. And it would give us a chance to evaluate who was the best candidate."

He was watching her closely now. He'd caught what she'd said. He just didn't jump on it right away. "And he thought this was a good idea?"

"He was willing to give it a try," she replied.

"That's because he didn't have a Chief Medical Officer to tell him what a bad idea it was."

She'd expected that, too. "In all fairness, you were just 'missing' then. You're our Chief Medical Officer."

He didn't speak right away. When he did, he was no longer facing her. "You wanted Starfleet to think it was about Bajoran nationalism," he said, putting the pieces together. "You didn't want them to send another Starfleet doctor, but you weren't satisfied with the Bajoran candidates. Or you weren't prepared to be. You planned a rotation from the start. You didn't want anyone to plant roots." He turned to face her, his anger replaced by wonder. "You were saving the post for me."

"Well, you were just missing at first," she confirmed for him. "No one wanted to replace you."

Bashir seemed to accept that but then slowly hook his head. "But after the body was found? Why not then?"

Kira stood and walked to one of the windows. She wasn't sure how to answer that. "Faith, I suppose," she said finally. "I can't really explain it. I just couldn't replace you then either. I didn't exactly know that you weren't dead, but I just couldn't accept that you were."

She could see in the window's reflection that Bashir was still at the table, though he looked up at her. "But you had no evidence to say I wasn't."

It was, in essence, the same argument Ezri had made. "None," she replied, turning towards him. "I guess I just couldn't let go of the hope that it wasn't true, that you were out there alone somewhere and would come back to us."

He was silent for a bit, just watching her. She let him. It was, she supposed, a lot to take in. Finally, he sat back in his chair and sighed. "I'm not the first person you've lost," he said. "You accepted Bareil's death, Ghemor's, your friends from the resistance--"

"And too many others," Kira interrupted, agreeing.

"Why me?"

Kira nodded and sat down across from him. "For one thing, you've been gone before. You've even been reported dead before. Section 31 is enough reason to be suspicious--"

This time he cut her off. "But there was a body," he said, leaning foward. "It was positively identified as me."

Kira leaned in, too. "I'm not saying I didn't miss you. I cried at the memorial service just like everyone else. I grieved. It wasn't some conscious thing I did. I just didn't change the rotations. I didn't let Starfleet fill your post. My head knew you were dead but my heart wouldn't hear of it." She touched his hand across the table. "And my heart was right, in the end."

He didn't speak at all after that. He didn't pull his hand away either, not until he leaned back again in the chair.

"It's your post, Julian," she told him. "We just have to work out the details."

He nodded and he let his eyes wander to the tabletop where her hand still rested. He spoke quietly. "They are going to kill me someday," he said.

She started to interrupt him, but he held a hand up to stop her. "Them or someone else. Promise me you will not risk this station again. You'll have to replace me."

Kira didn't like his pessimism, his acceptance of the idea that he would be killed. But it wasn't completely unexpected. Ezri would deal with that, she hoped, letting it go for now. "_If_ something were to happen to you," she replied, stressing the conditional nature of the promise she was about to make, "I will find someone to fill your post. No one can replace you."

* * *

"How did it go, Old man?" Sisko asked, looking up from the file he had open on his desk console. Another dilithium shipment had been hit. There were still bigger things going on than Bashir's return.

"Briefly," she replied, dropping herself into a seat. "He's different, but I can sense our Julian still in there somewhere. He's just been beat down a bit. I've cleared him for light duty. He and Kira are working out the schedule." She seemed chipper enough.

_More than a bit,_ Sisko thought. "What about what Troi said about him being emotionless?"

"She didn't exactly say emotionless," Dax corrected. "She said emotionally flat. It's more like he never hits a high note. Or a low note for that matter. I can't say I had an opportunity to see anything different from him. But it was only our first meeting. You can't expect him to be cured in a day."

"He's had two weeks," Sisko reminded her. He hadn't meant to sound so gruff, but the dichotomy of Bashir's behavior was frustrating. No one else saw him the way Sisko had seen him.

"Not of vacation," Dax snapped back. "Benjamin, he was marooned, alone, for six months. Some people wouldn't even be able to put together a coherent sentence after that. And his two weeks on the _Enterprise_ included being accused of genocide, a skirmish in which he and his patients hid under corpses, and an away mission in which he was trapped in another cave and fell into a room full of executed colonists. That's not very therapeutic."

Sisko held up a hand in surrender. "Sorry, Old Man," he offered. "I didn't mean to sound impatient."

"What's bothering you, Benjamin?" Dax asked. She'd seen right through him. Jadzia had been able to do the same thing.

"Nothing," he told her with a sigh. "Everything. This war. We're losing and I can't even figure out what the Dominion is up to."

"We're not losing," Ezri corrected. The sternness in her voice seemed out of place in her little-girl's face. "We may not be winning just yet, but we're not losing."

Sisko nodded, accepting her admonition. Belief could affect reality. He knew that, and that's why he rarely gave in to such pessimistic thoughts. It's why he had done what he did to get the Romulans into the war. He looked for ways not to be losing the war. But that way, the one that Bashir had confronted him with, was the reason he had given in to such thoughts now.

"So what's really bothering you?" Dax probed again. Ezri, it seemed, could see through him better than Jadzia had.

He wasn't going to let her do it though. He straightened up in his chair. "Old Man," he began, looking her right in the eye, "if I feel I need a counseling session, I'll let you know."

She frowned but accepted the dressing down without protest. She stood. "I'll leave you to your work then."

* * *

Bashir had wanted to start work that afternoon but Kira had insisted he wait until morning. She wanted to give him time to get settled again. He didn't want to tell her that he had too much time already. He didn't know what to do with himself. Outside of work, everything seemed pointless. His mind swam in endless circles of circuits and conduits. He recognized them. He'd visualized them over and over in the cave. They were replicators and transmitters and waste reclimators and the lights in his ceiling. They were the walls of his quarters, the panels in the corridors, the consoles in the Jefferies tubes, the instruments in the Infirmary, and even the engineering station in Ops.

_I'm a doctor,_ he thought, _not an engineer._ He didn't know why he wasn't letting his hyperactive brain work on the prion project he'd started so long ago. Or his work on the Blight. Or any of the other medical mysteries he'd used to occupy slow days before.

He was back in his quarters. He'd thought about going to Quark's or the Replimat but he just couldn't bring himself to face the crowds yet. Maybe that's what Kira meant by getting settled.

He'd gotten another message from his parents. It was getting easier to answer their questions. He still hadn't spoken to them in real time though. He just recorded a reply and sent it back to them. They were doing well. His mother had packed up his belongings. She wanted to bring them out to the station, so she could see him, but with the war on, it was hard for civilians to travel this far. And his father was still in prison. It wouldn't be long, though, before his sentence was over. Maybe Julian could come home for a visit.

He didn't want to. Not just yet. It wasn't just them. He didn't want to leave here. He didn't want to leave the protection, such as it was, of Starfleet. He couldn't protect himself from someone like Sloan back at home.

Sloan. He'd nearly forgotten. He'd been back at the station for more than twelve hours and he still hadn't worked out the calculation for the security code he'd need to enter this evening. That would at least give him a break from the conduits and boredom.

He knew they'd break the code eventually. Section 31 had more resources than he was even aware of yet. He'd been half-bluffing with Sloan. He got data, that much was true. Even a direct feed so that some of the information he'd gotten, such as the location of Sloan's ship that night, was up-to-date. But it was limited. He hadn't been given enough access to get more. Sloan would come for him again, but for now, at least, he had a reprieve. If he kept up the code.

It took two hours to work it out in his head. He didn't want to leave any records by using a computer or PADD. When he was finished he noted it was midday. He'd managed to pass half a day. Half a day. Of the rest of his life. At least he'd be able to work soon. That would help.

His door chimed, and this time, he couldn't guess who it would be. He sat up straighter on the couch and called for the door to open.

"My dear doctor," Garak said upon entering, "I do hope you weren't planning on eating lunch alone."

"I, I-" Bashir stammered, "I hadn't given it much, much thought, y-yet."

Garak's eyes widened ever so slightly. "Well," he said, "we should be going then. The Replimat is filling up quite fast these days."

Bashir shook his head in little movements. He didn't mean to say no, exactly. He couldn't decide how to respond.

"You're life isn't in here," Garak told him, surprising him. "It's out there."

He hadn't left the doorway and he didn't appear to be leaving without Bashir, so Bashir stood and followed him. He didn't really want to, but he couldn't offer an adequate protest. In his life before the cave, he'd almost always eaten out.

Garak didn't speak much on the way. He told the turbolift to take them to the Promenade, and he spoke a few words to get a table for him and Bashir. The whole thing caused quite a stir though, and Bashir could feel the eyes on him, the energy that made him uneasy.

"What would you like?" Garak asked after they'd sat.

"I-I'm not sure," Bashir answered. He was trying not to stammer, but Garak set him off-balance.

"Shall I order for you then?" Garak offered. He didn't wait for Bashir to answer, but ordered something Bashir had often eaten in the past. Bashir hardly noticed the food, though. He couldn't focus that well.

"I hadn't realized you were unable to speak," Garak went on. "My claustrophobia has produced that effect from time to time."

"Garak," Bashir tried, but he didn't know what words to follow up with.

"You look as if you've seen a ghost," Garak observed. "And you haven't touched your food."

Bashir glanced at his plate, but was unable to pick up the fork. "How did you know?" he finally managed.

"Know what?" Garak asked in reply.

"About my life," Bashir clarified. "What you said."

Garak set his own silverware down and met Bashir's gaze across the table. "I've been there, myself," he said.

Bashir didn't know why he was asking. "Where?"

"Tzenketh," Garak replied. "I wasn't claustrophobic before Tzenketh."

Bashir hoped he'd elaborate on that. He wanted to know what happened on Tzenketh and how Garak had gotten on with only claustrophobia to show for it.

But Garak didn't elaborate. "So what was your exile like?"

Bashir was disappointed but also relieved. He could handle such simple questions with objective answers. "A cave," he answered, trying to keep himself from stammering. It was a nervous response and he didn't want to be nervous. "It was a cave."

Garak's eyes widened noticeably now. "For six months? All alone? However did you keep sane?"

Bashir didn't know what he was asking. Was it a rhetorical question? "What?"

"However did you keep sane?" Garak repeated. "You must have had some technique to keep your mind under control. Converting a replicator to a transmitter was quite a feat. You had to have your wits about you. I would also imagine the cave was quite dark."

"Absolute dark," Bashir practically blurted. "I couldn't see at all."

"So how did you do it?" Garak pressed.

"I thought about it," Bashir told him. "I thought about it for months. Imagined it until I could see what I was going to do."

Garak smiled that enigmatic smile he had, the one that made it seem like he already knew the answer and was just testing Bashir to see if he'd get it right. "Amazing," he exclaimed. "I wasn't aware you could get a distress call from a Starfleet replicator."

Bashir shook his head. "You can't." He knew Garak knew that.

"The android," Garak surmised.

"Data," Bashir corrected.

Garak nodded. "And for Data to get the signal, the _Enterprise_ would have to be within a certain range. How did you know?"

"I didn't know," Bashir replied.

"So why do it at all?" Garak demanded. "The odds were astronomical. Why risk starvation to make a signal that only one being in the entire quadrant could have heard? You must have hoped he would be in range."

"I wouldn't call it hope," Bashir said, "not exactly. More like having nothing to lose."

"How fortunate then," Garak concluded, "that your odds paid off. Now you have a great deal to lose."


	2. Chapter Seven

**Star Trek: Deep Space Nine**

**Faith, Part II: Forgiveness**

By Gabrielle Lawson

**Chapter Seven**

Doctor Girani stayed on during his first shift back. Bashir was still on light duty. He'd worked out with her and Kira a gradual increase in his duties as doctor and as Chief Medical Officer. For now, Girani would keep most of those duties, though Bashir would be kept informed.

Bashir was satisfied with the arrangements. Though he felt ready to take on all of his duties, he understood their caution, just as he had with Crusher and Troi. Only he knew how his mind spun in circles when he wasn't working. Just standing in the Infirmary made him feel more like himself than he had felt in half a year. This was home.

Given his light duty status, he didn't see any critical patients during the shift. Girani took any war casualties that came in from the docked ships. Bashir was left with the day-to-day mishaps aboard the station. And there were a lot of them that day.

To be honest, he suspected most of the bumps and bruises he saw were merely an attempt to see him. The patients smiled and made the usual small talk. How was he? How had he been? Was it good to be back? Bashir smiled and answered each one as if it was the first time he'd been asked. There were a few more serious cases: an engineer with a sprained ankle, a child with a skinned knee, even a Telavian freight handler with a cracked tibia. He had a steady stream of patients right up until lunchtime and the end of his first shift.

He really didn't want to leave, though. He closed himself in what Dr. Girani still insisted was his office and updated the patient records for everyone he'd seen. He was stalling and he knew it. He felt peace there. His mind slowed down, concentrating on each abrasion or laceration. It didn't veer off into diagrams of conduits or layers of paneling as it had the night before. There was only the patient; he was only a doctor. The universe beyond the Infirmary door asked so much more of him than that.

Out there he had to face Garak's words. Garak could be so cryptic at times. Bashir sometimes wondered if the tailor/spy knew he was being so perceptive or if he just liked the sound of the words. _A great deal to lose._

Out there he'd already lost so much. Six months of time and memories and trust. Gone in an instant that took an eternity to pass. In here, in the Infirmary, nothing had changed. Medicine was still medicine; patients were still patients; and he was still the doctor he had been. This was all he had left to lose and it was everything to him.

* * *

Admiral Ross took the seat offered him, the one at the head of the table. The Romulan representative sat to his right. He was a tall man, imposing, nothing at all like Senator Cretak. Ross caught himself making that comparison and shut down the thought. He had no room for guilt.

General Martok sat to Ross's left. He was much easier to deal with, easier also than any other Klingon Ross had ever met. He didn't look down on other species unnecessarily. The general attributed that uncommon outlook to his time in the Dominion internment camp where he'd learned that 'Cardassians were clever, Romulans could be trusted, and even a Breen could have honor.' The occasion for that speech was Bashir's memorial, when he'd said he'd learned a human with will and compassion was a force to be reckoned with.

That was another thought Ross didn't want. He'd seen that force firsthand after the Romulan incident. Bashir had never looked at him the same way again. He was always formal and never crossed the line of insubordination. But he was always cold, unsmiling. Ross had felt both remorse and relief at the report of Bashir's alleged death. He didn't know what to feel now that he was back.

But that was hardly the major concern in the admiral's thoughts at the moment. Dilithium was on his mind.

"They're up to something," he finally said, after Captain Sisko and Commander Worf had taken their seats. "And we just got a little closer to finding out what that is.

"Last night the _Potemkin_ picked up a Cardassian distress signal." The ship had approached cautiously, fearing a trap. But he didn't bother telling them that. They could read the details in the report. Ross skipped to what was important. "They found a small scout vessel, hardly spaceworthy. The pilot was a human fighter pilot, Lieutenant Caldia Mtingwa. She was reported missing with the rest of her squadron after the Quarron Offensive over a year ago."

General Martok and Senator Parnal were each reading their PADDs now. Worf, as Strategic Operations Officer, already knew. Sisko, as Worf's commanding officer, had already been briefed.

"A prisoner of war?" Parnal asked, with an air of incredulity. "Escaped?"

Ross nodded. "Something very few have been able to do." He inclined his head in the General's direction. "And, while her exposure to Dominion plans was limited, it's more than we had yesterday."

"Are we certain she is who she appears to be?" Parnal asked.

Ross had anticipated the question. "We're taking every precaution. She has passed all medical exams, including a DNA comparison. She'll be under constant observation for the next seventy-two hours." Ross nodded to Sisko to take over.

"The Dominion," Sisko began as he stood, "is now using their prisoners for slave labor. Lieutenant Mtingwa was apparently used in some sort of experiment. She was placed in the ship with minimal instrumentation and no navigational capabilities. She reports that the ship was entirely controlled by autopilot. Her report's actually very fascinating reading, though it leads us to few conclusions. It appears as if she was shunted out of phase or something similar. While there, she could see the Dominion base from where her ship had been launched, but only as a ghostly image. Her sensors could not read it.

"Her ship began a self-destruct sequence. Ten seconds later she was shunted violently back here, some fifty light years from where she started. Her ship was damaged enough to prevent the autopilot from returning her to the base, and the shift was violent enough to disrupt the self-destruct sequence. The ship's dilithium was entirely consumed."

Ross picked up from there. "Lieutenant Mtingwa reports that well over fifty pilots were transferred with her to the base from the prison camp where she had been interned on Quarron IV. There were only six others with her when she was assigned to the scout ship. I think we can assume that the Dominion has been using up their stores of dilithium in this experiment. And I think we can also assume that we don't want them to succeed in whatever it is they're trying to accomplish."

* * *

"How was lunch?" Dax asked after he'd sat down.

Bashir felt his shoulders tense and hoped it didn't show. "It was fine."

Her lips turned down into something between a frown and a smile. "I saw you put your tray back full after Garak left yesterday. Is there a reason you didn't eat? Have you eaten today? Can I get you something?"

How to get out of that then? he wondered. He couldn't say yes, though he had skipped lunch to stay in the Infirmary, or she'd wonder why he wasn't eating. And he couldn't really tell her why Garak had upset him or what Garak had done with Sisko, could he? "No, thank you. I'm really not hungry. I had lunch in my quarters."

She forced a smile and he knew she suspected he was lying. But she didn't press.

"Kira said you were angry," Dax reported instead, "about her leaving your post open."

"I wasn't angry over the sentiment," he told her. There was nothing not to be dishonest about here. "I was angry that she'd been irresponsible where the health of this station's population is concerned. There should have been a Chief Medical Officer--a permanent one."

"And yet, you were worried you wouldn't get your post back."

Bashir nodded though he felt a bit defensive having to justify this. "I couldn't be both? Yes, I want my post back. But I don't put myself and my wants above the well-being of the crew."

"I wasn't insinuating that you would," Dax assured him calmly. "I just want to get at what you were feeling. Counselor Troi mentioned your theory of equilibrium. Do you still feel that way, now that you're home?"

_Ah, that._ He'd almost forgotten that. It fit. "Yes, for the most part."

Dax nodded. "Assuming you're happy to be back, what is it that cancels that happiness out?"

"Fear." It was an easy question. "I'm no safer here than I was on the _Enterprise_. Maybe less."

"Why less?" She looked genuinely concerned then.

Did she really have to ask? And how far should he go in answering? "Because security on this station hasn't proven adequate in the past. Why should it now? At least it's harder to beam in and out of a ship at warp. This station sits still. Its shields can be penetrated."

"By Sloan."

"On several occasions."

"He visited you on the _Enterprise_," she reminded him.

"He arrived by shuttle," he pointed out in return. "Though he did beam out."

"What did he want," she asked, redirecting the conversation, "when he came to visit you?"

Bashir quickly weighed his options on how much to tell her. He really didn't need to lie where Sloan was concerned, but he didn't particularly want anyone else to know about his device either. He decided to start with the obvious, what she should already know. "He wanted to frame me."

"To what end?" she pressed. "Would they have left you to rot in prison? Besides it was rather flimsy. He should have known that Benjamin could prove your innocence."

"I think he panicked," Bashir told her. And he believed it, sincerely. It still shocked him a bit. Sloan had shown himself vulnerable. "He hadn't expected me to escape the cave. I surprised him and he had to think up something fast. He was stalling for time."

"Time for what?" she pressed, almost sounding like Jake in reporter mode. "He visited you again, after you were released. What did he want then?"

"The same thing he's wanted since the first time," he replied. "For me to join them willingly. I refused."

"And he just let you go?" She didn't sound convinced.

There was more than one reason Sloan hadn't just forced him or abducted him there. "I was too public just then. I came back from the dead."

She smiled. "Quite a feat by anyone's standards. Let's hope you're too public for a good long while." Her smile faded. "I just don't understand why they don't just take no for an answer. Why would they want you for an operative when you are so vehemently opposed to what they do?"

Bashir shrugged. "They're insane?" He was only half joking.

"That must be exasperating for you," she said, and it was nice to have someone acknowledge what Sloan and Section 31 did to _him_.

"It is," he agreed. He wanted to tell her it was maddening, but thought that was probably not the best word for someone in his position to use. "It's frightening," he said instead.

"Did you talk to someone after the first time?" Dax asked.

"I told the captain, and Kira and Odo were there."

She shook her head. "You reported, and that was good, but did you talk to Counselor Telnori, or Miles? You told me--I mean Jadzia--but you didn't talk _about_ it. About how you felt."

_How I felt._ Of course, it wasn't the details she wanted, though they were what he wanted to discuss, truth be told. He wanted someone to want to hear it, someone to be as appalled at it as he was, someone who would pledge to fight for him, to protect him. He wanted someone to rescue him. But how likely was that? It was a pipe dream and he knew it. It was hard for anyone who heard to comprehend it, to take it all in. It was too much and they preferred to not know. So, no, Dax didn't want the details. She only wanted his feelings.

"No," he answered. "No one asked."

"You could have gone to see Telnori." Bashir looked away and she quickly added, "But you avoid counselors' offices. We're not the enemy, you know. We're not looking to trap you into saying something wrong. We want to help."

He felt some shame at that and cast his gaze to the floor. "I know."

"You tell your patients to see me. As a doctor, you know the good we can do." Her voice was gentle, her expression one of concern and not accusation. "Can you not accept it for yourself? Sometimes you're a patient, too. You're allowed that."

Bashir looked up at her like he was seeing her for the first time. She looked so young, naive even. But she wasn't. She was better than Troi. Better than Garak. Because Garak used his perception to throw him off-balance. Ezri used hers to reach out. And she was the first to have done it.

"Talk to me, Julian," she encouraged. "We can start there. We can start anywhere you want."

* * *

It had been two days already. Two days since Bashir returned from the dead to stand on Deep Space Nine. And Sisko had still not seen him since that night. Protocol would usually mean that Bashir would present himself to report for duty. But Captain Sisko hadn't forced the issue. Bashir had met with Kira, and the captain had let it stand at that.

He still didn't know what to do with Bashir. He'd sensed Bashir's uneasiness in the docking bay. It was nothing like what Sisko had seen on the _Enterprise_. That had been much worse. It could mean that the extra time he'd spent on the _Enterprise_ had done him good, calmed that violent streak within him. Or it could just mean that Bashir had covered it up in front of the others.

But Sisko was captain, commanding officer of Deep Space Nine. He couldn't go around avoiding his Chief Medical Officer. Though he wasn't officially Chief Medical Officer yet. Girani was handling that for now, letting Bashir ease back in to the post. That meant he wouldn't be at staff meetings for a least a few more days.

Sisko slammed the PADD he was holding down on the coffee table. He was finding excuses, and he didn't like it. He'd never been afraid of any of his officers before, not even when that alien virus had Kira (and Bashir, apparently) plotting mutiny. O'Brien was the paranoid one then. Sisko had been obsessed with building a clock. He looked over at it now. It really was a beautiful clock.

Stalling! Again. The clock wasn't an issue. The past wasn't an issue. Bashir was the issue. Bashir. When Sisko had first heard that he was alive, he was surprised but happy. He'd looked forward to welcoming him home, talking with him about what had happened during the last six months, maybe working out some of the distance that had come between them in the year or so before he'd disappeared.

Sisko remembered the hope in Bashir's eyes once he'd been beamed up from Auschwitz that first time. He'd trusted Sisko to save him. He'd trusted him. And the Bell Riots. They were together there and Bashir trusted him to make the right decisions to get them out of it. But Sisko also remembered those same eyes in the runabout on the way to Adigeon Prime. The trust was gone. Sisko hadn't understood it. He hadn't thought he'd done anything to cost that trust.

But he had.

He remembered the joke he'd made to Kassidy on the _Defiant_, how he'd said he liked Bashir better "this way." "This way" was impersonal, formal, all business, saying only what needed to be said. No smile, no greeting, just "Here are the reports." And Kassidy had caught him; she'd known he wasn't joking.

When had he stopped liking Bashir? Bashir, who made one feel comfortable in his Infirmary, who smiled when he walked into the room, whose enthusiasm sometimes got the better of him? Bashir, who stood up to a tribesman with a gun to his chest and demanded his medical supplies to treat Kira? He'd liked that Bashir.

Now he knew why Bashir had changed. Section 31. That was where it started. His foundation had been shaken. And Sisko, in his righteous indignation over what Bashir had uncovered within Starfleet, had missed that and ordered Bashir to join them.

The Federation was a big thing, not really quantifiable. Captain Sisko was Bashir's commanding officer, the only one he'd ever had. Bashir had admired him, respected him, trusted him. And Sisko had thrown him to the wolves.

He'd come to Sisko's office, as a Starfleet officer performing his duty, to report what had happened. But he'd also come as a victim, one who hadn't slept in two days, seeking support from his captain, the one who hadn't given up on him in 1943 and the one who had argued in his favor after his secret had been revealed. But Sisko had missed that.

It wasn't Bashir who had changed. It was him. Sisko had changed. Somewhere between the invasion and the incident with Garak, Sisko had lost himself. He'd let himself get so focused on the war that he'd lost sight of other things, other people. Like Bashir. And he'd stopped liking Bashir because he hadn't wanted to face it. He hadn't wanted to admit that he'd given up so much. Bashir stood for principles. Bashir was a walking conscience, and Sisko hadn't wanted a conscience around.

The door chimed, interrupting his thoughts and Sisko realized that again, he'd let his thoughts wander. He was thinking about Bashir but not about what he would do with him. "Come," he called, not knowing who to expect and not really caring.

It was Garak, and Sisko couldn't remember a time when Garak had ever come to his quarters. "I hope I'm not disturbing you," the tailor said.

Sisko was puzzled over why he'd come at all. "No," Sisko replied. "I was just thinking. About Julian."

"Ah," Garak said, raising his head just a bit. "I've been thinking about him myself. May I sit?"

Sisko nodded to the couch. "And what have you thought? Have you seen him?"

Garak sat down, but he didn't relax into the cushions. He sat right on the edge and kept himself stiff. "I take it you haven't," he surmised.

Garak was sometimes too perceptive. _Probably made him a good spy_, Sisko thought. He shook his head.

"We had lunch yesterday," Garak said, answering Sisko's question. "He's not quite himself."

Sisko nodded. "He's been through a lot, Garak."

"But I've been watching him. He doesn't seem as out of sorts with others. When he _is_ with others, that is. He spends most of his free time in his quarters."

Sisko caught that but wasn't going to open up to Garak, not without Garak opening up first. "He was alone a long time. It will take awhile for him to get used to being around people again. Dax doesn't think we should worry. At least he's not holed up in a holosuite."

"True," Garak conceded. "But he was stammering like the day we first met. Do you remember what he was like that first year? Eager for adventure, but flustered when it arrived. He wanted to be a hero. It was quite charming, really, to see him so at a loss for words."

"He was a hero," Sisko let out, though he hadn't meant to say it, not to Garak. But it was said. "He just hadn't caught up to himself yet."

Garak nodded. "He did catch up to himself. He stopped stammering years ago."

Sisko sat up straighter and turned himself more square to Garak. "Yes, he did." He hadn't stammered once in their confrontation on the _Enterprise_. "What are you saying, Garak?"

"I seem to upset him," Garak said, standing. "He seems fine--well, fine enough, all things considered--with others. He's flourishing in the Infirmary already. But me. . . ."

Sisko actually felt a little relieved. He wasn't alone in Bashir's wrath, it seemed. "He knows, Garak."

Garak had turned away, but he turned back now. "Knows what?"

He sounded sincere enough, but Sisko knew he must have at least a suspicion or he wouldn't have come to see him. Garak could easily have gone to Dax or O'Brien. He and Sisko didn't interact all that much. Not since. . . . "He knows what we did. He was told. He knows more than I do. Where did you get the data rod?"

Garak sat down again. "Ah, that." So he had suspected. "That would explain his behavior. Somewhat."

Sisko wasn't worried about Garak's perception of Bashir just then. "You didn't answer my question."

"It doesn't matter now, does it?" Garak asked. "What's done is done."

"It does matter," Sisko held, now feeling some of that anger Bashir had thrown at him. Did Garak know? "What did he want with the gel?"

"I didn't ask and he wasn't forthcoming," Garak stated quickly, standing again. "He had the upper hand, Captain. He had what we wanted--what you wanted--and he wasn't in the mood to negotiate. He wanted the gel, nothing else."

Sisko stood, too. "Who was he?" he asked. "What ties did he have to the Dominion?"

That spun Garak around quickly. "The Dominion?" Sisko thought he looked a little paler than his usual gray. He looked away and Sisko waited for him. "It had to be indirect," he finally said, softly, as if speaking to himself, "or they would have stopped us, exposed us somehow."

Sisko thought about that and knew that Garak was right. The Romulans joining the war was a big blow to the Dominion. They would have made a move to ensure that the Romulans either stayed out or joined them. Some of the anger melted away and he sat down again. "Whoever he was, the gel ended up with the Dominion."

Garak sat, too. "What do you think they'll do with it?"

Sisko felt the bile rise in his throat again. "They've already done it." And he told Garak about Deyon III.

Kassidy arrived before he'd had a chance to tell Garak about his own encounter with Bashir. He wasn't sure he should anyway, so he didn't mind the interruption. He didn't know how to explain Garak to Kassidy, though.

"Mr. Garak," she said, smiling at the guest but throwing a questioning glance at Sisko, "what a surprise!"

Garak smiled back and offered his hand. "Yes, I don't often make house calls, but the Captain is a busy man, and I needed a break from all those transmissions." He turned back to Sisko. "If you want to get those pants, I'll have them mended for you by morning."

Leave it to Garak. "No need to stay up with them tonight." Sisko stood and walked toward the bedroom. "Whenever you get a chance."

"Nonsense," Garak said. "It's just a mend. It will take no time at all."

Sisko nodded and quickly retrieved a pair of pants from his closet. He made sure to keep them folded in order to hide a tear that didn't really exist. He handed them to Garak, who tilted his head and took his leave.

"What happened to the pants?" Kassidy asked Sisko, sitting beside him on the couch.

Sisko remembered the dinner he had warming on the stove. "Grease splatter," he told her, and it hurt to lie, even this little bit. "Burned a small whole in the left thigh."

She looked into his eyes, concerned. "You weren't hurt?" she asked as she touched his thigh.

"No," he assured her. "Just the pants."

* * *

Bashir felt rather worn out after his talk with Ezri. She seemed a lot happier when he left her office, less suspicious. At least in that he'd been successful.

He, however, didn't feel much different from before. What he did feel was relieved. He'd gotten by without letting anything dangerous slip out. It _was_ nice, though, to have someone interested in him for a change, and not just a report. She had empathized with him, not in an invasive way like it would have been with Troi, but in a comfortable way. It was like she understood.

And that made her more dangerous than Troi ever was. He had felt himself trusting her several times during the session and had to remind himself to be careful. Trust can be betrayed; he'd learned that lesson well enough.

Besides, if he let his guard down, he might talk about Sisko and what he knew. And, although it might make him feel better to not carry it alone, it could only make matters worse. Secrets didn't stay secrets on this station. Besides, even if he only told Dax, in confidence as her patient, what good would it do? What would it change? Would it win the war? Would Section 31 leave him alone? No. Nothing would change, except that he would make an accessory of Ezri the way Sloan had of him. So there really was no point.

He was on the Promenade and he thought briefly of stopping in at Quark's to see if O'Brien was there. But the noise was so loud from there. He just couldn't put on the façade he'd need for Quark's.

Bashir turned toward the turbolift that would take him back to the Habitat Ring and his quarters. He still had to work out the code for his device.

* * *

O'Brien put his dishes back into the Replicator and kissed Molly goodnight. While Keiko put Kirayoshi down for bed, he dusted the model again, still waiting for the chance to run strategies with Julian like before. O'Brien hadn't seen him in two days, not since the _Enterprise_ had docked. He'd actually entertained the idea of kayaking again in the hopes of dislocating his arm just so he'd have an excuse to go to the Infirmary. But he knew that Julian was only working in the morning at present. He could only go kayaking after work, and that would give him a different doctor.

"You could call him."

Miles hadn't realized Keiko had returned. "Asleep already?" he asked, surprised that Yoshi would be down so soon.

"He was very tired," Keiko replied, wrapping her arms around him. "Didn't even put up a fight."

"I don't want to disturb him," Miles said.

"He might want to be disturbed," she returned. "Wasn't he glad to see you on the _Enterprise_?"

"I don't think 'glad' would quite characterize it." He turned around to face her. "He wasn't unhappy or annoyed or anything, but he didn't seem to be glad about anything. It's not like him. It's not like him to be this quiet."

She put her head on his chest near his shoulder and held him close around the middle. "If anyone can imagine what he went though, Miles, it's you."

Miles knew what she was referring to. The Agrathi prison. But it wasn't quite the same. "But I wasn't alone. I wasn't blind."

"You were alone at the end," she held, looking up at him. "And what was there worth seeing? My point is, you weren't exactly happy when you got back either. You can relate. Go, talk to him."

O'Brien did remember. He had returned from his implanted imprisonment a guilty man. He had killed his only companion in twenty years. He had wanted to put it behind him, telling himself that it hadn't happened, that Ee'char wasn't real, that none of it was real. He had tried to bury the guilt in work. He had wanted to be with his family, start his life again from the moment it had changed.

Julian didn't have the guilt maybe, but he would want the same thing. His old life. Only he wouldn't find it. Just as O'Brien hadn't. Time changes a man whether he wants it or not. O'Brien had found his way to simply living and finding joy in his life, as it now was, again. But it hadn't come easy.

Julian had tried to help early on, but Miles had pushed him, and everyone else, away. That was what Bashir was doing. And maybe, like Miles had, he needed some time to find that he couldn't make it on his own before he could accept the help he needed.

"I don't think it's the right time," he told his wife.

She put her head back down against him. "At least just let him know that you're here when he's ready."

"I will," he promised her.

* * *

The rest of the evening was quite uneventful, and Bashir found himself disappointed even though he knew he didn't want visitors. He was used to contradiction. It was his old life beckoning him, the thing that he wanted most. The old Bashir would be having dinner with friends or colleagues, sharing a round of ale at Quark's, or enjoying a set at Vic's.

And yet, he couldn't bring himself to be the old Bashir. The old Bashir had been naive, blissfully unaware of the depths into which good people could fall headlong.

The current Bashir knew better than to leave evil only to the evil. The good were just as capable. So the current Bashir had decided to heed his wariness toward crowds of people in uncontrolled situations instead of his urge for company and entertainment. Besides, he didn't want to answer any more questions about where he'd been for the last six months.

He had eaten alone in his quarters and calculated the code for his device. Safe from Sloan for one more day, he turned his attention to the power transfer conduit he'd been working on in the lower levels.

Yesterday he had drawn a diagram based on his memory of how the conduit had felt. It had taken some time and it was nearing midnight by the time he'd finished. He had tried then to do research, to compare his diagram to the one in the computer. But sitting in his quarters in the utter quiet of the station's night had proved unsettling. He constantly felt as if he were being watched, or as if the walls were moving behind him.

He couldn't go out though. It was still too early. Someone else would be up, maybe strolling along the Promenade. Sisko did that sometimes. Or he used to. Bashir didn't know if he still did. He didn't know the man at all anymore.

_How could he?!_ Bashir asked the wall the same way he'd asked the cave. How could he have done what he did? How could the same Sisko, the one that had risked his life to fulfill Bell's destiny of bringing the sanctuary districts down, who let the woman he loved go to prison for helping the Maquis to break the law, the one who had risked his career to help the Bajorans see the truth of the Circle, how could he have lied, falsified evidence, and helped to cover up at least four murders so that hundreds of thousands more could die in the war? How could the man who was standing by his bedside when he woke up from the Lethean's coma be the one to order Bashir to place eighty-five liters of the same gel the Lethean had attacked him for in a cargo bay to be handed over to some stranger with unknown motives? How could the one who'd risked everything by beaming down to a Nazi concentration camp to bring him back be the same man who would abandon him to Section 31?

And how could Bashir ever look at him the same way now? How could he look up to him like he did before? How could he trust him?

He couldn't. It was that simple. He just couldn't. And if someone like Sisko could change so much, anyone could, including himself. But he wasn't ever going to let that happen. He couldn't trust anyone else because he couldn't control anyone else. He could control himself.

And he could control his surroundings. To a point, anyway. He stood up and looked at his walls, his windows, his ceiling. They weren't enough. Sloan had come and gone as if they weren't even there. And a changeling could just slip under the door, through conduits or ducts or anything. Hell, Laas had been fog once.

Security locks for quarters on the station really only covered the doors, kept people from breaking in. They didn't stop beaming or seeping, or flowing. What he needed were sensors, something to warn him if something or someone tried to come in through the wall or ceiling. Or shields to keep them from coming in at all.

Sitting back down at his desk, he pushed the PADD with the conduit schematics aside. He had work to do. 


	3. Chapter Eight

**Star Trek: Deep Space Nine**

**Faith, Part II: Forgiveness**

By Gabrielle Lawson

**Chapter Eight**

Kira didn't bother cursing at the computer when it woke her up. She'd been an early riser for years now. With the resistance, she'd be up and on the move before the sun had even risen. By comparison, mornings on DS Nine were like sleeping in.

She turned her head as she rolled out of bed and felt a sharp zap of pain shoot down her neck to her shoulder. _It's always the day after,_ she thought to herself. She'd felt great after the game last night. But she'd overdone it. Her arm was still stiff and sore, too. She wasn't worried though. It would give her an excuse to see how Julian was doing in the Infirmary. She was dressed and ready to go in less than twenty minutes.

The Promenade was still quiet this early in the morning. A few shops were open to offer coffee or breakfast to those coming on duty. Or coming off duty. But it was much more subdued than later in the day.

The Infirmary, however, was always the same. Sure, there were times when there were more patients or more of a sense of urgency, but the feel of the place was the same. Bright, airy, clean, and inviting. Kira couldn't say that about all doctors' offices, but Julian's had always been that way. Here on this dark station or on the bright _Defiant._ The only time that had changed was when Julian was gone, and even then, it hadn't disappeared completely.

Kira stepped through the door from the still-sleepy Promenade to the fully-awake Infirmary and was greeted immediately by the man she wanted to see.

Bashir rose from the console he'd been studying and smiled warmly. "Colonel. How are you this morning?"

_Amazing._ She could have sworn he was the same Bashir as before. There was no sign of the weariness she'd seen just a few days before. "Just a little stiff in my shoulder," she told him.

"That was quite a match last night," he said, showing her to one of the biobeds.

That surprised her. She hadn't thought he'd been out much. She hadn't seen him at the springball court. "You saw the game?" she asked, sitting down.

He smiled again. "Well, no," he admitted, "but I heard all about it this morning. Right shoulder?"

Kira nodded and he tested her movement by rotating her arm a bit. She flinched when he ran his fingers along her neck and shoulders, rubbing the muscles gently.

"There _is_ such a thing as too much of a good thing," he teased finally, releasing her. "Go easy on it for a few days." He pulled a vial from a nearby shelf and loaded a hypospray which he placed at her neck. He then began to massage her shoulder, starting right up at her neck. It hurt at first, but the drug was swift and his kneading fingers loosened the knotted muscles until it felt quite good to have his hands there. So good, in fact, that her left side was getting jealous.

"Better?" he asked.

Kira sighed and nodded. "You do good work, Doctor. Now how about you?"

Bashir had stopped the massage at her nod, and now his hands dropped to the mattress beside her. He rolled his eyes. "You're _not_ going to ask me how I'm doing."

"Yes, I am," Kira insisted, "and I want an honest answer, not just 'I'm fine.' You've been back a week. You seem to have settled in here again, but what about the rest?"

"What about the rest?" he repeated, putting the question back to her.

"Well, is it home yet? Is Dax helping?"

He surprised her a bit by hopping up onto the biobed to sit beside her. "She's helping me to understand how I feel, why I'm feeling what I feel. It's still a little too crowded out there just yet. Everyone watches me, asks how I'm doing. I'm not comfortable being the center of attention. But it's getting easier. Every day."

Kira covered his hand with hers for a moment. "I'm glad. Take your time. You don't have to rush it. If you ever want to talk . . . to someone who's not a counselor. . . ."

He squeezed her hand. "I know where to find you."

* * *

Bashir walked her to the door and watched her go. He couldn't step across the threshold of the Infirmary with her. Not yet. The staff meeting, his first since his return, was not for another ten minutes. He'd come to work early, since he was up anyway, so he could settle himself. The Infirmary was home to him.

"You know," Jabara said behind him, "I remember when she could do nothing but glare at you in disgust."

Julian smiled, remembering. "It wasn't disgust exactly," he replied, turning back away from the Promenade. "It was exasperation tinged with distaste. I think I did that to a lot of people back then."

Jabara waved a hand to dismiss that thought. "They just didn't know you, and didn't know you were worth getting to know. You get excited about things that they can't begin to understand. They couldn't relate. They learned though. She did."

"Miles didn't like me either," Bashir said, more to himself than the nurse. "He hated me. Told me so. Said I wasn't an 'in between kind of guy.'"

Jabara laughed. "I think he's right!"

"And you?" he asked her. "What did you think of me, way back then?"

Jabara set down the supplies she was holding and crossed her arms over her chest. "When I first saw you, I thought you were far too young. I thought you were Starfleet, an outsider who was going to come in here and show us everything we were doing 'wrong' or backward. I was all set to hate you."

Bashir couldn't think of anything to say. He understood that. He'd seen it a lot with Bajorans. But he'd never seen that from her.

"But then I saw you work," she went on. "Right there, nearly the first day. The Cardassians thought they'd shoot the station out from under us. And there you were, on the Promenade, walking among the wounded, calmly deciding who to treat and how. You were competent, compassionate. And then there was Odo. I saw that. 'Hold it there!' you said, and he did. He wanted to squirm, to find someone else, but you held him with your voice and he couldn't help but obey. Everything I'd thought you were flew out the door right then."

That was a good moment. Odo had harrumphed at him up until then. That one moment earned him some respect. And, more importantly, saved a woman's life. But so much had changed since then.

"I think I snapped at all the other doctors while you were gone," she said, picking up the supplies again. "They were too young, too old, too serious, too undisciplined, too arrogant, too bossy, too lenient. There was always something, some way they didn't measure up to you. I think they got the wrong impression of me."

"You know, someday you _will_ have to work with other doctors," Bashir teased. "But thank you anyway."

She smiled again, big and bright. "Just remember all that when you go to that meeting. You're not a stranger. You belong here."

Bashir took a deep breath. The meeting. It was time. "I'll try," he promised. "Hold down the fort?"

"Always."

* * *

Sisko leaned back in his seat and tried to appear relaxed. Under the table, though, he gripped the arms of his chair. This was it. He'd avoided--and he hated that he'd done it--Bashir for a week now, but Kira, Dax, and Girani all agreed that Bashir was competent to resume his duties as Chief Medical Officer. That assessment also meshed with Troi's, since she had let him serve in Sickbay on the _Enterprise_ and even on a rather harrowing away mission. And nothing in any of those assessments gave Sisko any indication that Bashir was anything like he'd seen him on the _Enterprise._ That personality, it seemed, was reserved for him, though a bit of it had apparently shown with Garak.

Sisko couldn't help thinking about what Bashir would be like now. Had the time on the _Enterprise_ helped? Had the week he'd spent here on the station calmed his anger and sense of betrayal? Would being in a group matter? Sisko wasn't ready to meet Bashir one on one yet.

The doors opened and the first of the senior staff arrived. Worf. Not surprising. He nodded his greeting and then took his chair. O'Brien was not long behind. He looked tired but also anxious. "Julian's back today?" he asked.

Sisko just nodded. That was enough. No comment to the positive or negative. Just a nod.

"One would hardly know that he was back on the station," Worf commented.

"He is keeping to himself a bit," O'Brien acknowledged, "but that's not really surprising. He's been through a lot."

"Perhaps too much," Worf grumbled.

That upset the engineer. "What's that supposed to mean?" he challenged. Sisko would like to know as well, but he played it neutral.

Worf looked uncomfortable. But he didn't back down. "He is a healer, not a warrior--"

Sisko cut him off at that. "If you're implying that makes him weak, you're wrong."

The door had opened again. "Wrong about what?" Ezri asked before sitting down next to Worf.

"It is not important," the Klingon muttered. Worf could be diplomatic when he needed to be.

Kira and Odo arrived next and took her seat. "You played well, Colonel," Worf offered.

Kira smiled. "I played too hard. I had to stop by the Infirmary this morning to get the kinks worked out."

Sisko almost thought everyone had stopped breathing, the room grew so quiet. They all wanted to know the same thing. How had Bashir seemed to her?

But they didn't get a chance to ask. The door opened one last time and deposited the young--not so young anymore--doctor. He stood still in the doorway for a moment, as if startled by the silence. But he shook that off and moved to the table. His greeting was simple. "Good morning."

The others smiled their hellos and offered their hands to welcome him back. Sisko just watched. The subtleties of Bashir's greeting were not lost on him. Bashir had meant it for everyone, but had directed it to Colonel Kira. Not to Sisko. Bashir had yet to look at Sisko directly. So it was still there.

Bashir took a seat next to Ezri, probably the one person he'd seen most since his return. "It's good to see you again, Doctor," Sisko offered, trying hard to keep any doubt or wariness from his voice. "You'll be getting a new patient today."

"Thank you, sir," Bashir replied, still not meeting Sisko's gaze. His voice was clipped and formal, but subtly so. No one else seemed to notice. "I assume you are speaking of Lieutenant Mtingwa."

Sisko was surprised, though he thought maybe he shouldn't be. Bashir was on the ball, as always. He'd read the report and gotten himself up to speed before stepping back into his old post. The old Bashir would have done the same thing. Had, in fact, when he'd first arrived on the station and again after their trip to Adigeon Prime. "Yes, as the rest of you may be aware, the lieutenant escaped from the middle of a Dominion experiment. She's been under treatment and constant observation for the last week or so. She's not a changeling, and she's not a clone. We checked for that, too, even hypnotized her to be sure. She did sustain some injuries, some of them severe and unusual. Starfleet Medical wants you on it, Doctor."

"Has she told us more about the experiment?" Worf asked, after a sideways glance at Bashir.

"Not so much," Sisko replied. "She's told us all she knows. You have all read the report?" He waited for everyone to nod in turn. "She was able to give a better description of the base, the barracks she was held in before the experiment, but there wasn't much more she could say about the experiment itself. We have the ship, so describing it is unnecessary. That only leaves the experiment."

"And whatever it is they are trying to do," O'Brien spoke up, "is taking a lot of dilithium. It could be a phase shift, but why that much dilithium? And why the damage?"

"Good questions, Chief," Sisko acknowledged, though he didn't have any answers. "We don't know yet, but the Dominion apparently isn't done. Another shipment was hit yesterday, just outside the Milot system." He punched up a diagram on the screen. "They didn't get much though. It was a decoy. The real shipment went through Kiaral. Mtingwa said the other pilots would disappear about one every four days. They could be getting desperate for dilithium soon. The Alliance will be trying to make sure they don't get it. The _Defiant_ has been assigned to investigate the whole thing. We need to find that base or find the other ships they've been sending out. Chief, you get to take a look at the ship Mtingwa brought back. Dax, see if you can't help her remember anything else that might be helpful."

Bashir had been quiet since he was addressed at the start of the meeting. Sisko hadn't expected more from him. "They're trying to spy on us," he said.

"They have changelings for that," Worf told him.

"The changelings are sick," Bashir reminded him.

"They've used clones," O'Brien offered.

"They used _a_ clone," Bashir pointed out, "and he failed. We don't know that they've tried again. But that's not the point. Such a spy is still an individual. While that's beneficial, it's also limited. One still needs surveillance. That's what they're after. Concealed surveillance."

"It would seem that way," Sisko said.

"Why not just use cloaks?" Dax asked.

"We've got them," Kira replied. "And we can detect them if we know what to look for. They're wanting something unique. Something we wouldn't know how to counter."

Odo grunted. "If they're out of phase we wouldn't know if they were sitting right outside our perimeter."

"Yes, we would," O'Brien countered. "Now that we know what to look for. It only depends on how out of phase they go. And if they go too far, it wouldn't do them any good anyway."

As each person spoke, the other's heads would turn to look at the speaker. Except for Bashir. And Sisko, since he was watching Bashir. Bashir was staring out the window. "It's too simple," he said quietly. Sisko wasn't sure if he was trying to contribute to the meeting or just commenting to himself.

O'Brien asked the question for all of them. "What do you mean?"

Bashir blinked once and turned toward O'Brien, snapping out of whatever state he'd been in just a moment before. "Phase has been done," he said. "It's not that hard. Given, it's rarely been done with a whole ship, even one so small, but it's been done enough. It wouldn't cause that kind of damage. Why would so many prisoners disappear? The ship shifted back of its own volition. It was programmed to do that. They wanted it to come back. They wanted them all to come back. It wouldn't take forty-plus pilots to get it right."

Sisko liked this Bashir so much better than the one on the _Enterprise_. This must be the Bashir the others were seeing on a consistent basis. "So they're after something more complicated," he summarized. "Can you imagine what?"

"I'll have to give it some thought," he replied.

"Do that," Sisko ordered. "And that goes for everyone. This investigation is our top priority. The _Enterprise_ has been assigned to assist us. They are following up some of the dilithium shipment attacks, trying to trace warp signatures and such. Commander Worf, you'll want to keep in contact with Commander Riker; Chief, with LaForge. That's it. Let's get to work."

He stood and watched them leave. Bashir still hadn't looked at him.

* * *

The ship was amazing. Amazing that it had allowed Mtingwa to survive at all. O'Brien thought it looked like it had been pieced together from scrap to begin with. Half the burn marks on the outer hull appeared to be from Dominion and Cardassian weapons fire. The others were made from the inside out. The main hull had been compromised in at least three places. The wings were threatening to split entirely from the rest of the hull. The dilithium containment compartment had been enlarged to the detriment of most of the life support system and one of the ship's engines. The chamber was now filled with large chunks of blackened crystals and a lot of ash. Ash. Dilithium didn't usually turn into ash as it got used up. Not one spot on the inside of the chamber was not blackened by soot and warped by heat.

Just as the report had described, the ship had been gutted of most of the necessary equipment. Only a rudimentary communications system remained, no voice audio and no video. Environmentals consisted only of a small heating unit and several vents around the cockpit. There was no helm. The ship had been controlled entirely by remote. Life support was provided only by Mtingwa's environmental suit and she had been running low on oxygen when the _Potemkin_ found her. The one thing of note that remained was a warp symmetry generator tied into the engines.

O'Brien thought about what Bashir had said about the Dominion wanting a new way to spy. Phase would work, if it wasn't so easily detectable. One could literally be holding position right next to the station observing all the comings and goings of ships. But that was hardly a help if you couldn't hear the comm traffic.

That was something. Comm traffic. Why a comm system at all if they were controlling the ship by remote? They obviously didn't think they needed to speak to Mtingwa since they didn't provide voice communications capabilities. The difference in phase would distort any subspace comm signals coming from the other side. They needed something that could detect and relay comm traffic from the Alliance back to the Dominion base through wherever it was they were trying to go with this ship. So wherever it was, however it was done, had to support the reception and transmission of subspace communications and render them undetectable to their target.

O'Brien pushed himself out from underneath the ship and yelped as his arm got caught on a sharp edge of torn hull. He sat up and wrapped his fingers around his forearm. He felt blood, but he also felt something hard, which stung his fingers. He hated to look, but he had to. He removed his hand and tilted his arm up. A shard of metal from the ship, approximately one and half centimeters long, was protruding from just above his elbow. He hissed as he gingerly pulled it free with his thumb and forefinger. He was about to throw it down on the deck when the thought occurred to him. Now that it wasn't attached to the ship, he could have the science lab run it through any number of tests a lot easier. Maybe wherever it had gone had left something behind as a clue. He clamped the remaining fingers around the bleeding wound and headed for the Infirmary.

* * *

Bashir had left the meeting as soon as it broke up. He had excused himself from the others by telling them he had to prepare for Mtingwa's arrival. It wasn't exactly a lie, but it wasn't the truth either. A few minutes of hellos and small talk wouldn't have delayed anything as Mtingwa wasn't scheduled to arrive for another hour. He couldn't talk just then though, without the business of the meeting to focus on. All that was left was Sisko. And Sisko was too much just then.

He brushed past Jabara and kept himself to his office for a quarter of an hour with no disruptions. It helped. His pulse slowed and his thoughts settled on the task at hand: his incoming patient.

He pulled up her records and allowed himself to put Sisko out of his mind. He'd had no idea her injuries were as severe as they were. It was amazing that she'd survived at all. She'd been burned over seventy percent of her body, mostly on her limbs and back, but also partially on her face. Her lungs were damaged from heated air and fumes.

"Doctor?" Jabara called, sticking her head inside the door.

Bashir looked up from Mtingwa's records. "Yes?"

"You have a patient."

It was too early for Mtingwa. Bashir quickly shut down the file and moved into the main room.

"Hi, Julian," Miles O'Brien said. He was sitting on a biobed, holding his left arm in his right hand. "At least I wasn't kayaking," he offered with a grin.

Bashir let out his breath. If O'Brien could joke, it wasn't too serious. "It's the wrong arm for that," Bashir replied, smiling with relief. Then he was serious. He lifted O'Brien's hand away and found a rather deep gash. "How did it happen?"

"Crawling around in that ship." O'Brien cringed a bit as Bashir cleaned out the wound. "Piece of metal speared me. Broke off right in my arm." He held out the piece in his other hand. "Figure we can really run it through the scanners now."

Bashir looked at it then picked up some forceps and took the shard from him. "No reason we can't start right now," he said. Jabara held out a small petrie dish and Bashir dropped the piece into it. "Start with a scan for contaminants," he whispered to her, hoping that nothing dangerous had infiltrated the wound.

Bashir turned back to his patient. It had only taken a few seconds to give Jabara the shard, but the cut was bleeding again. He picked up the dermal regenerator and began to wave it over the torn flesh, even as he set the biobed's scanners to check for contaminants in O'Brien's blood stream.

"You know, Julian," O'Brien began, hesitating before he spoke again. "I haven't seen much of you since you got back. I won't ask if you're okay. I know how annoying that gets. But we're worried about you."

Bashir felt the walls inch upward inside him and resented it. This was the Infirmary, his Infirmary, his safe place. "Who's we?" he asked, wishing he hadn't. It sounded defensive, or paranoid. Or both.

"Keiko and me," O'Brien answered. "And the kids. Molly misses you."

_And Yoshi?_ Bashir thought. Yoshi probably didn't even remember him. "There's no need," Bashir told him. "I'm okay. It took some time for you to adjust, I remember."

O'Brien nodded. "It did. But you were there when I needed you. I'll be there, too."

That last bit was spoken so quietly. Bashir knew how hard it was for Miles to say that. "I'll remember that," Bashir told him. He finished healing the cut and administered an antibiotic, just to be safe. "There," he said. "All done."

Miles flexed his arm back and forth. "Good as new," he claimed. "I even think I could beat you at darts. Been awhile since we played."

Bashir put on a smile for him. "Ah, but you've had six months to practice. I'd be at a disadvantage."

Miles shook his head. "Not with those genes of yours. Besides, there wasn't anyone to play with."

Bashir was sure that last part wasn't true, but it was nice to hear just the same.

"How about tonight?" Miles asked, getting up from the biobed. "After shift. Just a round or two. I won't keep you. It'll be fun. Maybe help you lose some of your tension."

Bashir doubted very much that playing darts with Chief O'Brien in Quark's with a bar full of people would help him lose any tension at all. But darts with O'Brien was part of that old life he wanted back. He had to try. "Alright," he agreed. "For a little while."

O'Brien's shoulders dropped and he blew out his breath in a smile. "Great! Now, how about that piece from the ship?"

"This way," Bashir said, happy to be getting back to business. But he hadn't missed the relief in the Chief's actions. "Let's see what it tells us."

* * *

Kira cleared the Klingon battle cruiser for docking. It had been out for nearly four months now and was in need of supplies and repair. The _Defiant_ hadn't been out to battle in a couple of weeks, but, still, the war went on.

So did other things. Like Julian. Section 31 just wouldn't leave him alone, war or no war. And now it had changed him. While he had seemed himself, though admittedly less cheery, in the Infirmary, he had seemed a bit off in the staff meeting. He had practically run off after it was over, and Kira had noticed how he never once looked at Captain Sisko. As she thought about it, Kira realized Bashir had not come to Ops once since his return. She wondered if he'd seen the captain at all since the airlock.

Captain Sisko, for his part, had looked very tense this last week, despite the lack of action on Deep Space Nine. Of course, he'd been tense since before the war began, and he took the war very much to heart. But this was unusual for him. There was no small talk, no dinners in his quarters, no after-hours at all, really. He was almost being as reclusive as Julian.

Something was going on between the two of them, and the only thing she could think of was Section 31. She remembered the shocked and devastated look on Bashir's face when Sisko had told him to say yes to them when they returned. He'd obeyed the order, on two occasions now. The first had gotten him tortured, and the second had left him marooned. It was possible that Bashir was holding Sisko responsible for that. But why would Sisko allow himself to feel guilty?

Yes, he'd given the order. Even Kira had not agreed with that one. But it was Section 31 who had harmed the doctor. Still, she knew trauma was not a rational thing. Bashir could be angry at the captain because the captain was there to be angry at while Section 31 was not. Bashir could be explained. Sisko wasn't so easy.

Another ship requested docking clearance. The _Theresa_. The medical ship that was carrying Lt. Mtingwa.

* * *

Doctor Bashir stood over his new patient. Despite her time under medical care, she was still in very serious condition. The damage to her lungs was severe and her condition had actually deteriorated. It had been a delicate transfer from the _Theresa_ to the Infirmary, but now she was resting with as much comfort as Bashir could give her.

Her eyes fluttered for a moment and then opened. She looked around the room a bit and then looked at him.

"Hello," he said, touching her arm lightly. "I'm Doctor Bashir. You're on Deep Space Nine now."

"You're the genius doctor . . . who came back . . . from the dead?" she asked in a hoarse and halting whisper. "Doctor Morton told me . . . about you."

Bashir forced a smile for her. "I wasn't dead," he corrected. "I was marooned. And I'm not exactly a genius." The smile faded. "I was genetically enhanced as a child. Does that bother you?"

"Not if it means you can maybe help me." She shifted position and winced for a moment. "You're one of the escapees?"

Bashir nodded. "So are you now, but I'm surprised you even knew about that."

"All the prisoners knew," she told him. "Gave us hope." She grinned. "And it drove the Vorta crazy."

Bashir chuckled, finding pleasure in her last statement. "Tarnished their record, did we?"

"Two Klingons, a Romulan, a human, and a Cardassian, working together," She spoke with pride and awe. "It's kind of a microcosm of the Alliance--except for the Cardassians."

Bashir nodded. "It's a shame all the allies here didn't hit on it sooner." Still, he knew why the Romulans had finally joined forces. It was nothing like what had happened in the camp.

"You triumphed," she went on. "Working together. That makes me think we can win this war."

Her voice had gotten stronger as she spoke, but she was still having trouble breathing. He knew how severe her injuries were. He knew she had little chance, genius doctor or not, of surviving.

She'd been watching him while he thought, and when he hadn't replied, she spoke again. "Do you think you can help me?"

He'd never been one to give false hope to his patients. That much hadn't changed. "I'm going to try," he told her. "But your injuries are--"

"I know," she said, interrupting. "Doctor Morton told me. My lungs are breaking down, my internal organs compromised."

"Maybe if you could describe more for me what happened to you," he suggested. "I read your report, but I want to know what you saw, what you felt. Did you hear anything? Smell anything?"

She nodded. "The first time," she began, "it wasn't so bad. There was a flash of light. The ship shook. Then it stopped. Everything seemed normal except the stars were a different color and I could see through the base, like it wasn't really there."

"But the ship was fine?" Bashir asked. "Just then. No heat?"

She nodded again. "Except they'd set it to self-destruct. I could hear the countdown. Thirty seconds. I thought I was going to die then. But suddenly it all started again, just before the count was up, only worse. The flash of light was brighter and it lasted longer. It burned my eyes. The ship shook so hard I thought it was going to come apart. The nose looked liquid, like a bridge in an earthquake, you know? Not solid anymore. And it got hot. I was wearing an EV suit. It had to be burning in there for me to feel it. But I felt it. The air in the helmet became so hot it was like breathing lava. And it smelled funny."

"Smelled funny how?" Bashir coaxed. Her suit should have fed her clean oxygen, which should have caught fire after a certain temperature and with any kind of spark.

"Acrid, like something rotten, but metallic, too."

Bashir could see her eyes were getting droopy. "You rest now," he told her, patting her lightly on the shoulder.

* * *

Their time was shorter now. Now that Bashir was back to full, active duty.

Ezri found herself saddened at that. She saw so little of him, as it was. And when she did, he was hiding from her. That was not the way she'd hoped things would be when she'd first heard he was alive. She'd missed him, far more than she'd realized. She'd hoped to see him across a table at Quark's, smiling, reminding her that there were still reasons to smile. Before he'd gone, he just always seemed to be around when she needed someone to cheer her up, or to just sit and understand.

It was unrealistic, of course, and she knew it. Once she found out the circumstances of his disappearance, she knew she'd be his counselor once he was back on the station. Her training took precedence over her daydreams and hopes. He couldn't walk away from what had happened and just be there for her. She had to be there for him.

She had tried to tell herself that she could still be his friend, that she was only his counselor while in session. But the staff meeting had reminded her that that wasn't true. He was her patient. Twenty-six hours a day, whether she saw him or not, whether he hid in his quarters or the Infirmary. He wasn't going to call her to have dinner. He wasn't going to talk to her like he did before. There was a distance between counselor and counseled that made friendship lose its hold.

Ezri didn't want distance. She wanted to be closer. Julian, though, was not ready for such a thing, even if he was willing. And he was her patient. It wouldn't be right. She had to put her feelings aside in favor of his health.

The door chimed. Her heart sped up. _My patient,_ she told herself. She focused her thoughts on the morning's staff meeting and called for him to come in.

"I'm sorry to drag you away from your work," she offered as he sat down.

"It's what the doctor ordered," Julian quipped, though his expression carried more gravity than mirth.

Ezri nodded, staying serious with him. "Would you have done things differently, if your roles had been reversed?"

He looked up, not quite rolling his eyes. "Haven't we already been through this?"

_Yes,_ she thought, _and we had a very good talk last time._ So she wondered why he was leading her to it again. "What did you think when Miles ditched his counseling sessions after the Agrathi prison?"

"I'm not ditching them," he told her, being defensive in his toned down way. "I'm here."

"But you don't want to be," she said. "You don't want to be here. You don't want to need to be here."

He looked away, and she knew that was as much agreement as she was going to get at that point.

She softened her voice, "We all need help sometimes. Even you."

He didn't turn back to face her, and she knew he was hiding again. A new tack was needed. "How was your first full day back on duty?"

"Fine," he said, still not turning, "at first. Kira came by, and O'Brien. Minor problems. Then she came."

That was the source of his gravity. She could tell the way his shoulders had dropped, the way he'd breathed out that last bit. "Mtingwa?"

He turned back, but his eyes were on the floor. "She's dying. They expect me to pull some sort of miracle."

Dying? Ezri hadn't expected that. Severe injuries, yes, but Captain Sisko had not said 'dying.' "Who expects that of you?" she asked, focusing on her patient, not on his.

"Doctor Morton, the captain, Starfleet Medical, all of them," he replied, still looking at his feet. "Why else would they send her here? I kept Bareil alive. I found a vaccine for the Blight. I'm a mutant."

Ezri hated when he called himself that. The others, Jack and Patrick, had called themselves that with pride. With Julian it was a character judgement. "You can only do your best. If she dies, it won't be because of you. What does she expect of you?"

He sighed. "She just wants me to try."

* * *

Martok had offered, and, too often nowadays, Admiral Ross didn't feel like turning him down. Even if it meant eating gagh. The Promenade was noisy, full of people shopping, eating, or just talking. People living. That was the draw. Just living. Just putting aside the war for an hour or two. Captain Sisko had said he'd meet them at the Klingon restaurant.

Ross moved though the crowd and noticed the one person he hadn't expected doing the same. Bashir. It was hard not to notice him as the crowd subtly shifted out of the doctor's way. Ross had heard that Bashir was keeping to himself after duty. And with Lieutenant Mtingwa now in his care, he simply hadn't thought Bashir would be heading to a rowdy place like Quark's. Perhaps it meant he was settling in finally.

As much as Ross tried to push thoughts of Bashir and Romulus away from each other, he had never wished real harm on Bashir. And he didn't want animosity between them. The war was enough animosity. Perhaps Bashir's recent disappearance had given him a new perspective, one where they could go beyond the decorum duty prescribed and move on to genuine civility.

Bashir saw him, too. And he looked a bit nervous. He darted his eyes, and Ross realized he was trying to find a different way around. But someone waved at him. Chief O'Brien. The two used to play darts. Bashir waved back. Trapped, as it were.

That really wasn't how Ross wanted it. He didn't want Bashir running off every time they ran into each other. He wanted to make peace, to move beyond Romulus and the misfortunes that war had forced on them both.

"Doctor!" Ross called out, motioning Bashir over. Ross was standing near Quark's. That and protocol would keep Bashir from avoiding him.

Bashir moved forward, his face unreadable. "Admiral," he offered, no inflection in his voice.

Ross let it go. He was the admiral. Diplomacy was part of his job. Besides, he knew what Bashir had gone through. "I was glad to hear you'd been found." He offered the younger man his hand, and a smile. "Welcome back."

Bashir's eyes narrowed, his hands remained at his sides. When he spoke his voice was cold, not unlike Koval's back on Romulus. "How's that aneurysm?"

Ross dropped his hand. He couldn't say anything more. He couldn't move from that spot. Bashir stepped past him and on into Quark's. He hadn't forgotten, Ross knew, and he hadn't forgiven.

* * *

Captain Sisko watched from the turbolift. He'd stopped there when he'd seen O'Brien wave to Bashir, deciding he'd wait until the doctor was safely inside the bar before he met up with Martok and Ross at the Klingon restaurant and vaguely thinking he could maybe beg out of the dinner altogether.

But then he'd seen Ross call Bashir over. Bashir had given a report, sketchy though it was, of what had happened on Romulus and how Ross, supposedly his contact in his mission against Section 31, had not been there when he was needed. One piece not in place and the whole thing had crumbled. If Ross had been there, Bashir might not have turned to Cretak. She might not have been arrested. An illness had detained Ross, but Bashir's dour properness around him ever since had said he resented the admiral for it. Sisko wanted to see now if that resentment would cause Bashir to lose the mask he'd been wearing for everyone else but Sisko.

He couldn't hear what they were saying, but he could see Ross offering his hand to Bashir and Bashir refusing it. Bashir said something that left Ross looking pale before joining O'Brien in the bar. Ross stood in the middle of the Promenade for a moment and melted back into the crowd.

Sisko stepped out from in front of the turbolift. He didn't know what exactly Bashir had on Ross, but he felt a bit of relief knowing that he wasn't alone.

* * *

"What did Admiral Ross want?" O'Brien asked as Bashir reached him just inside the door to Quark's.

"Just wanted to welcome me back," Bashir told him, not wanting to get into it any farther. It was loud in the bar, and he had to raise his voice so that O'Brien could hear. He moved further inside, hoping to pull O'Brien away from the topic of Ross as he pulled him away from the Promenade. "Find anything new on the ship?"

O'Brien shrugged and followed. "Yeah, don't know what it is yet though. The dilithium broke down on a molecular level, that much is sure. But there's something else there I just can't figure."

They passed the bar and Quark waved them over. "What can I get for you, gentlemen? Doctor, your first drink is on the house."

Bashir regarded him, skeptical of this show of beneficence. "That's generous of you, Quark."

"Consider it a welcome back gift," the Ferengi enthused. "It's a terrible thing to lose a good customer."

Bashir decided not to take offense. "Thank you," he replied. As for the drink, Quark had said 'first' after all. Had he offered more, Bashir would have been suspicious. "Make it a root beer then."

"Wouldn't you like something more substantial, to calm your nerves perhaps," Quark suggested.

"What's wrong with my nerves?" Bashir asked. He'd been trying to hide his insecurities. He'd fooled a Betazoid counselor. How had Quark figured it out?

Quark smiled and brought out a bottle that wasn't root beer. He started to pour. "It's just that it's a big crowd and you've been keeping to yourself. I thought the noise might make you jumpy."

Bashir nodded, relieved it was just that. "With the exception of the last sixth and a half months, I've lived on this station for the better part of seven years. The noise is nothing new. And I believe I said 'root beer.'"

Quark must have given up on him, because the Ferengi dropped his smile and turned to O'Brien. "What'll it be, Chief?"

"Scotch," O'Brien answered. "My nerves could do with a bit of calming."

Quark poured the drinks and then went to tend other customers. Bashir picked up his root beer and moved towards the end of the bar where their dartboard still hung.

O'Brien was apparently not ready to play, as he took up a stool and sat down with his drink. Bashir would rather have played and left. The noise did bother him, and so had the admiral.

He sat down next to O'Brien and looked over the bar. So little of it had changed. Quark was at the other end, arguing with Morn as usual. Someone shouted 'Dabo!' and Bashir turned. A barely-clad dabo girl was congratulating the winner, a short Norellian with blue hair and a turned-up nose. Nearly every chair and table in the whole establishment was taken. A few of the faces were new to Bashir, but it was still the same Quark's. Only he had changed.

"How's the root beer?"

O'Brien's question brought him out of those thoughts. He realized he hadn't actually taken a drink yet. "It's fine," he said, sipping now. "Just like I remembered."

O'Brien didn't act as if he'd even heard. "You know what I can't fathom? The darkness. How'd you manage without the slightest bit of light?"

Bashir sighed and took an even longer sip. He didn't want to talk about the cave. "It was like being blind," he finally said, trying to dismiss it. "Other senses learn to compensate for the lack of sight. Tell me about your mystery, with the ship."

"All the readings are off," O'Brien said. "They're right, but they're not right. They're just off. It's just strange. I've been puzzling over it all day. I need a break. Shall we play? I've kept your darts."

Bashir looked at the box Miles held out to him. He hesitated to touch it a moment. He hadn't thought about the box for months. "Thank you," he finally said.

They stood up and stepped to the area in front of the board. "You want to go first?" Miles asked.

"You can," Bashir told him. He remembered enjoying darts very much, but it didn't seem that entertaining now. It seemed more of a waste of time. So many other things were more important than throwing darts at a board. His patient was dying, for one.

"So how was it on the _Enterprise_?" Miles threw his first dart, just above center. A twenty. A good shot. "Did you spend much time with Data?"

"He visited quite often," Bashir told him. "Caught me up on everything, the war, mostly. You know he has an emotion chip now?" The second dart hit a three, just below center.

"Yeah, I'd heard that." Miles threw his last dart dead center. His face lit up in a smile and his shoulders relaxed. "Though I didn't think it was working properly," he added.

Bashir envied him that release of tension. Small talk and a bulls-eye, aided by a bit of scotch. If only it were so easy. "He's got it worked out now. He mostly keeps it off though. The war's a bit hard to take."

"Wish I'd gotten to visit him a bit more." Miles retrieved his darts and stepped to the side. "He was a good friend."

Bashir remembered their compromise and moved back towards the tables. "What about Riker? Were you friends with him?"

"Yeah," Miles replied. "Not as close. He's a fun guy, though. Had a poker game every week with several of the senior staff."

_Fun?_ Bashir wouldn't have called him fun. "So you knew him well?" He took his first shot. Dead center.

Miles harrumphed. "I was kind of hoping you were out of practice."

"Want me to step back more?" Bashir asked.

O'Brien smiled and waved that thought away. "You'd be standing on that table. It's not likely you'll hit all of them."

Bashir nodded and prepared his second dart. "You didn't answer my question."

"Riker?" He took a sip of his scotch. "No, not well. I mean, I knew him. I knew of him. I didn't spend a lot of time with him outside of work." He nearly dropped his scotch when the second dart hit the center as well, knocking the first out of the board. As it was, the liquid spilled on his hands. "You sure you weren't practicing in that cave?"

"I was blind and you had my darts," Bashir told him, but he was just as surprised himself. It used to be hard to hit the board from this distance. He threw the last dart as quickly as he could and, still, it hit center.

They both stood silent for a moment. Bashir couldn't take his eyes off the darts. What six months ago would have thrilled him, now sent a shiver down his spine. "Miles, I'm sorry," he offered.

"For what?" O'Brien asked. "For not letting me win? We don't have to play this. Let's just go have some dinner. Keiko would love to see you."

Bashir shook his head even before he'd decided. He just wanted to go. "Maybe tomorrow," he said, hoping that would placate O'Brien. "I just want to go back to my quarters." He turned to go.

"You didn't finish your root beer," O'Brien tried. But Bashir was already working his way through the crowd.

* * *

O'Brien watched his friend go, not sure if he should follow. He wanted to say that the darts meant nothing. But they did mean something, and it was almost scary. Perfect. Too perfect. What did that say about Julian's mind that he could do that without aiming?

But Miles wasn't as afraid of Julian as he was afraid for him. Julian was hurting more than he let on. Miles knew how that felt. He'd done the same after the Agrathi prison. He'd pushed his friends away, including Bashir. He hadn't wanted help, hadn't thought he deserved it.

Maybe Julian felt he'd be weak if he asked for help. They say doctors make the worst patients, and Julian never had been one to talk about his own weaknesses. Miles didn't know what to do. Julian was always the stronger one when it came to things like this.

Suddenly, O'Brien felt a wave of gratitude for his wife. He downed the rest of his Scotch, retrieved the darts, and left for his quarters. For just a moment he thought he saw a strange man in striped clothing from the corner of his eye as he exited the bar. But when he stopped to look closer, the man was gone.

* * *

Bashir couldn't stop moving even when he'd returned to his quarters. He felt like a rubber band drawn too tight, like an engine stuck in warp nine. He couldn't stop. His mind wouldn't stop. That was why he couldn't sleep more than an hour or two a night, why he laid awake taking apart the walls in his head, or tinkering in the lower levels. It was why he could put three darts into exactly the same space on a board more than three meters away.

What had he become? For six months in that cave he'd worried about losing his mind. But instead he couldn't get away from it. He wanted to rest, to not think, for even just a little while, but when he tried, the fears would come. Sloan would come and he wouldn't be ready. The Dominion would steal him away before he could think of a way out. His mind was the only defense he really had, the only one he could count on. Too much could happen if he let his guard down.

He took the time to calculate the code and then began to work out. The coded device would keep Sloan at bay for a while longer. And perhaps the war would keep the changelings busy. Tonight, he wanted to sleep.

As he had before, he began with stretches but felt impatient and soon moved on to more exertive exercises he remembered from the Academy. Things he'd learned from Section 31. He practiced movements, martial arts katas and stances, kicks and blocks. When his legs began to shake from fatigue, he dropped himself to the floor to work his torso and arms just as hard.

His uniform became sticky with sweat, but he didn't stop. He could still think. He could still remember all he'd said to Troi, all he'd kept from Ezri. He still felt the energy pumped through his body by his racing heart. He closed his eyes against the stinging sweat that dripped down his face and pushed himself up on his arms. His back strained but he lowered and raised himself again and again.

Bashir let his knees fall to the floor and folded himself back onto his feet, flattening his torso against his thighs and his face against the floor. His arms stretched out before him, reaching almost to the spot where they anchored his pushup. It was a good stretch. But it wasn't enough. His arms were tired, but not tired enough. His mind still ran in circles, thinking this and that, in spite of the fifty push-ups he'd just completed. He wasn't the least tired. His body was, but not his mind. His mind had to be quiet if he was to sleep.

He hadn't told Troi that he wasn't sleeping. He hadn't told Ezri either. He'd be relieved of duty, and the times in the Infirmary were the best part of the day, the times when he almost felt whole again. But the truth about equilibrium, despite the fact that he'd meant everything he'd said when explaining it to Troi, was that it was a fake as much as he was, as much as anything he'd let Troi see or Ezri hear. The real truth, the one he even tried to hide from himself, was that his body was an automatic shell. Each breath was an effort he couldn't help but take. There was a hole inside him, threatening to swallow him up, but his lungs still took the next breath; his heart still beat; his eyes still opened in the morning, even if he hadn't slept at all.

He got back up on his knees and stretched his arms back to their positions. Up on his toes. Down. Back straight. Chin to the floor. Up. One hundred and one. Down. Up. By one hundred twenty his arms were shaking. He forced them to drop him down again and lift him up. Down, up, down, up. Two more. One twenty-five. He didn't stop. Down, up, down . . . . He collapsed, panting to the floor, sweat dripping into his eyes. He didn't even bother to brush it away. He inhaled, first one breath and then others in quick succession. He could wear his body out, but his mind kept going anyway.

* * *

Benjamin Sisko tried to listen to the conversation at the table, but his mind refused to stay there. He should have tried harder. He should have pushed Garak instead of letting Garak push him. He should have made an effort to find out who wanted the gel.

_Foolishness!_ he chided himself. Yes, Garak had pushed him, manipulated him into going farther and farther, but he'd taken the first step himself. He'd set out to find evidence that the Dominion was going to attack the Romulans and when there wasn't any, he'd created it. That was his idea, not Garak's. The gel was a detail, one piece of the whole structure that made the lie possible. Not just a lie. A crime.

What would they do if they knew? Kassidy might understand. She'd worked for the Maquis. She broke the law to do something she believed in. He'd believed, wholeheartedly. He was so convinced that they'd lose the war without the Romulans. But she'd had to spend six months in prison. Would she understand why he got to stay free? She hadn't hurt anyone. He'd caused thousands to die, millions.

And Jake. What would Jake think of him? He was supposed to set an example for his son. He was supposed to teach him about ethics and principles.

"Hasn't he been through enough?" Kassidy asked. Sisko snapped back to attention. Bashir again. It was always Bashir.

"That's why they want me to do the story," Jake replied. "Because I know him. They think he'd open up to me, that he'd trust me."

Sisko doubted that. Bashir wasn't opening up to anyone, no one except him.

Kassidy put down her fork. "What did you tell them?"

"That he's a friend. I told them I wouldn't sacrifice a friend for a byline." Jake dipped his head and glanced at the captain. "I also said the station's commander wouldn't allow it."

"You're right about that," Sisko told him. His stomach churned between pride and shame. He had taught his son about values.

Kassidy smiled. "Good for you, Jake."

The door chime interrupted the discussion. "Come," Sisko called. He was surprised to see Admiral Ross when the door opened.

Ross nodded his hellos to Kassidy and Jake. "I'm sorry to disturb your meal, but I need to borrow the captain."

Sisko wiped his mouth with his napkin and stood up. "What is it, Admiral?"

"Not here," Ross said. "We're meeting in the Ward Room."

Sisko left his napkin on the table and met the Admiral at the door. "I'll be back," he told his family. "Go on with dinner."

Once in the corridor, he hoped Ross would be more forthcoming. But the Admiral kept silent the entire way. The door to the Ward Room opened, and Sisko saw some familiar faces. Worf, Martok, and Parnal. But there were others. Admiral Benetti and two Romulans Sisko hadn't met.

"Now that we're all here, we can begin," Ross said, as Sisko took one of the two remaining seats.

Worf was standing at the other end of the table. "Two hours ago, Starfleet Intelligence forces confronted and killed a changeling posing as one Doctor Wilhelm Pfenner of the Aranus Institute on Millani Twelve."

"The Millani system is not part of the Federation," Parnal pointed out. Sisko wasn't sure if he was making an observation or an accusation.

Benetti responded, "No, but the Institute employs nearly one hundred Federation citizens. The Millanines requested our help when Pfenner's peers began to suspect him."

"I was not questioning your actions," Parnal explained. "I was questioning the Dominion's. Why Millani Twelve? Was Pfenner working for Starfleet Command? Was he a spy? Millani Twelve is sufficiently distant from the front as to pose no strategical advantage."

"He wasn't working for us," Ross told him. "Aranus is a research institute more concerned with theoretical science than practical. There doesn't seem to be much reason to take Pfenner at all. Which is why we can only assume this has something to do with their recent interest in dilithium shipments."


	4. Chapter Nine

**Star Trek: Deep Space Nine**

**Faith, Part II: Forgiveness**

By Gabrielle Lawson

**Chapter Nine**

"Doctor Helmut Pfenner," Sisko said, beginning the morning staff meeting. "It is estimated that he was replaced as early as four months ago." He paused a moment for effect. "Which would be about the same time the Dominion's hunger for dilithium increased."

"Why do they need a doctor for that?" O'Brien asked.

Dax spoke up. "He isn't a medical doctor. He's a subspace theorist." When every one turned to look at her, she blushed. "Jadzia read some of his work."

Kira shook her head. "Why a subspace theorist if they're trying to spy on us?"

"Old Man, do you remember what Doctor Pfenner was working on?"

"He'd proposed a new model of subspace communicators," Ezri replied. "It wasn't that spectacular. But that was a year ago. He'd finished the book. He was probably on to something else by the time they got him."

"The head of Aranus Institute reported that Doctor Pfenner had been on sabbatical, researching. He hadn't said what he was researching," Worf explained. He'd spent the night investigating on orders from Sisko. "When he returned four months ago, he began working on a three dimensional subspace model. The Institute assumed that had been the subject of his research. But some of his colleagues felt it was 'too simple' for Doctor Pfenner's enthusiasm for theoretics."

Bashir summed up the situation. "So we don't know what he was really working on before the Dominion got him."

"Only that it has something to do with subspace," Sisko replied, noting that, yet again, Bashir had managed to avoid any eye contact.

It was a new wrinkle, hopefully a clue to help them solve the puzzle of the Dominion's latest experiment. Would subspace be the piece that made the rest of the clues come together? "Old Man," Sisko said, deciding on his orders, "I know you're not the science officer anymore, but you've got the memories. I'd like you to dig back into Pfenner's work. See if you can find anything helpful. Doctor, you still have Mtingwa--"

"For a few more hours," Bashir interrupted.

Sisko didn't take offense. Mtingwa was dying. Bashir had never taken a dying patient easily. "Is there anything you can do for her?"

Bashir shook his head. "Same things I did for Bareil. Maybe. In the end, it won't help."

Sisko nodded, even though he knew Bashir wouldn't see it. He felt bad for Mtingwa, but there was still work to be done. "Mr. Worf, anything from _Enterprise_?"

"Not much, sir," Worf grumbled. "They have traced several attacking ships' warp signatures back to the Erilli sector. However, that sector is well behind enemy lines. Their scans cannot penetrate without drawing unwanted attention."

Sisko nodded at that as well. "Chief?"

"I sent Commander LaForge some scanning results from the ship. While I couldn't put my finger on what was different about the wreckage, I was hoping he could. It's breaking down, just as the dilithium did. It's going to crumble to pieces, sir, right in the docking bay, given enough time."

Bashir dipped his head at that, closing his eyes. Perhaps there was some correlation with Mtingwa's condition. Sisko didn't want to think about that. "What does that tell us?"

"Nothing in particular," O'Brien admitted, "except that something phenomenal happened to that vessel. They're messing with something big, sir."

The rest of the meeting was rather ordinary--extraordinary in wartime--with each department head offering reports that varied little from day to day. Supplies were needed, guests needed quartering, energy consumption had increased by two percent over last month, etc. When the meeting ended, the main thing on everyone's agenda was still the Dominion's mystery experiment.

And Bashir. Ezri continued to see him. Everyone else continued to not see him. And Sisko had continued to avoid him. _Not this time,_ he told himself.

As the others stood and moved toward the door, Sisko called out as casually as he could, "Doctor, could you stay for a moment?"

Bashir froze and visibly tensed, but he turned, expressionless, away from the door. Sisko waited until the others had left before he spoke. Bashir however, only moved far enough from the door to allow it to close.

"I'm sorry about Mtingwa," Sisko said, hoping to break the ice with talk of his patient.

"I'm sure she'll appreciate the sympathy," Bashir replied, and Sisko couldn't tell if he meant it to be a sincere remark or a bit of subtle sarcasm.

He didn't really want to talk about Mtingwa anyway. He wanted to see if being on the station had taken away some of Bashir's rancor. "You seem to have settled back into your duties nicely."

"Thank you, sir." Clipped, formal. Nothing further than business.

"What about your free time?" Sisko asked. "Settling in there?"

"My free time isn't your concern." There was a hint of harshness in that. Bashir kept his eyes on the table, not on Sisko. He was trying to control it, Sisko could tell, the anger that Sisko had seen before.

"We were friends once," Sisko tried.

Bashir didn't reply.

"If I could change the past," Sisko went on, "I would. If I could undo what I did and find a better way, I would. But I can't do that. We have to find a way to coexist here. I can't change what I did, but I'm working on changing what I do. I'm not focussing on the war so much that I'm losing sight of my people. Of you. I'm not going to make the same mistake twice."

Now Bashir looked up. "Are you so sure?" he asked, regaining some of the venom he'd had on the _Enterprise_. "You meant what you said in the sanctuary district. And yet, you didn't live up to those words, did you? You may even mean what you say now, but there's a lull in the war. What happens when the fighting gets heavy again, when the casualty lists start growing, when ships disappear and systems are occupied? What then? And what about when Sloan breaks my code and comes for me? Will you even notice? Or will you order me to go with him?"

Sisko didn't know what code Bashir was talking about, but he didn't figure that was the important issue here. Bashir had a point. He could say he would try, but he couldn't be sure of the future. "I can say I'll do my best," he finally said. "I don't know what else I can say."

"You can't say anything," Bashir said, calmer now. "You can't change what you did. And you can't guarantee what you will do. You can't be trusted."

Sisko smacked a hand down on his desk. He wanted to do more, to break something but he didn't want to act out in front of Bashir. "That's not fair! I'm not the only one who makes mistakes. And it _was_ a mistake. It was a huge, horrendous mistake, I'll give you that, but it was a mistake nonetheless. You've made them. Am I to assume that you aren't to be trusted?"

Bashir stepped forward, anger clearly visible in his eyes. His voice was low though, almost a whisper. "I won't break my principles to suit my mistakes. I won't bend."

Sisko closed his eyes. He couldn't remember a time when Bashir had bent. "Why did you come here?" he asked finally. "You knew I'd be here."

"I wanted my life back," Bashir replied. "This was my post, not just yours. Why should I have to give up what I had because of what you did?"

"You shouldn't," Sisko agreed. "But you can't go on like this. Have you told any of this to Ezri? To Troi?"

"And what should I tell them?" Bashir asked. "Should I tell them how I lost my faith in everything I used to believe in? Should I tell them about you? Should I make Dax an accessory, too?"

_God, no._ Jadzia had been the closest to know what he'd done. She knew he wanted to convince the Romulans, but he never told her how he'd accomplished it. He hadn't wanted to implicate anyone else. Section 31 implicated Julian, forcing him to become part of the cover-up. Sisko didn't want it to go any further. And neither he nor Bashir wanted word to get back to the Romulans. "So I'm the only one who knows how you truly feel?"

Bashir turned his back but didn't leave the room. Sisko knew he'd hit something there.

"And you know that I can't tell Dax either," he continued. "So where do we go from here? I'm the captain and you're the Chief Medical Officer. We're going to run into each other from time to time."

* * *

Bashir didn't respond. Sisko had won the point. Bashir didn't have an answer. He'd known Sisko would be on the station but he hadn't dwelt on it. He wanted his life back. He ignored the fact that Sisko would be a part of it.

"I suppose we could keep to business, duty and nothing else," Sisko suggested, and Bashir found himself nodding. It was all they could do, wasn't it? Sisko couldn't be counted on for anything more.

Sisko wasn't finished. "But it's not just me, is it? I saw you with Admiral Ross. You have something against him, too. Romulus, I'm guessing, though you never gave me the details."

He waited but Bashir still couldn't speak. _Yes, of course, it was Romulus._ And what good were the details? It was just another case of sacrificing Bashir to the god of war.

"You won't spend time with O'Brien. No one sees you when you're off duty. You haven't gotten your life back."

Bashir felt his stomach drop. His legs felt weak, but they held him up. He didn't want to have to sit down and display his weakness to Sisko. Riker's words about Tom Riker came back to him. _But he couldn't get his life back. He couldn't just pick up where he left off._

"Don't you trust them?" Sisko asked. "Did they betray you, too?"

Bashir closed his eyes tightly, not wanting to be there anymore, not wanting to hear anymore. But he shook his head in answer. _But they could,_ he thought. "I didn't think you would either," he whispered.

Sisko was silent a moment, but Bashir couldn't turn to look at him. Finally, he spoke again. "So you've got nothing left. That's what you said. You came back here hoping to find something but you can't trust anyone."

"I trust me," Bashir blurted, wanting desperately for Sisko to be wrong.

"Do you? You left Quark's very quickly last night."

The darts. No, he could trust. He could control his own choices. The darts were different. That wasn't the same as making a choice.

"What can I do besides say I'm sorry?" Sisko asked again. "I'm human, just like you. Humans make mistakes. I made a terrible one. I can only try to do better in the future. How can I make it easier for you?"

Bashir's hand shook as he reached out to lean on the back of a chair. He didn't know. He wished none of this had ever happened because he couldn't see how it could ever be put right. He couldn't stay any longer. He had to get back to the Infirmary. His answer was so quiet, he wasn't sure he'd even said it out loud. "Restore my faith."

"I don't know how," Sisko admitted.

Bashir turned and left the room before he could say any more.

* * *

Kira looked up when the turbolift stopped. Captain Sisko got off and headed right for his office. He didn't so much as acknowledge her presence. Or anyone else's for that matter. His jaw was set tight and his hands were balled into fists. Had the doors to his office not been electric, Kira was sure he would have slammed them shut. Bashir again. Somehow.

Kira decided to go see him. She knew Sisko wasn't likely to talk. Bashir, though, had seemed more like his old self at the meeting. He was down about his patient, but that wasn't uncommon. He'd been that way before. He cared.

She logged off her station and motioned over another officer to take her place. She stepped onto the turbolift and told the computer to take her to the Promenade.

There was a moderate bustle of people that morning and it took her a moment to exit the turbolift as she waited for a group of off-duty Starfleet crewmen to pass. She looked down the Promenade toward her destination but her eye was caught by something out of place. Or someone. Just in the doorway to Quark's. A man in a striped suit and hat. She'd seen such an outfit before. On Bashir, and on the men that shared his barracks. The man disappeared inside the bar.

Kira pushed her way past a Bajoran couple and made for the bar. But when she got to the door, the man was gone. Quark was washing glasses behind the bar. "Kind of early, isn't it, Colonel?"

"Did you see someone come in here?" she asked him.

"Lots of people come in here," Quark told her, smirking. "You looking for someone in particular?"

"I saw someone," she said, still looking around. "A striped suit. It was strange."

"Striped?" Quark asked, repeating her words. "No, didn't see any stripes."

Kira was almost ignoring him, though she found it odd that Quark hadn't seen the man when he'd walked right through the main level door. She nodded and moved a bit further into the room. She scanned the upper levels.

He was looking back at her. He was leaning on the railing above and he was looking right at her. He was not a young man, and yet he wasn't old. He might have been her age, she supposed, except he wasn't like her. His face was dark, but also pale, unhealthy pale. His cheekbones protruded prominently under the skin on his face and his eyes. . . . She felt their gaze. The sounds of the bar became muffled to her ears until she heard the hum of the station itself. The man nodded once and turned toward the upper level exit.

"Colonel?" Quark asked behind her. "Maybe you need a drink after all."

Kira shook off the eerie feeling the man's eyes had left her with, and the bar sounds once again filled her ears. She ignored Quark and hurried back out to the Promenade. She looked up, expecting to see him passing the rails on the upper level. He was quick though and she just barely saw him step into the turbolift.

Kira ran to the turbolift shaft on the lower level and called for the lift. It arrived, but when the doors opened, the car was empty. A destination, however, had already been entered. Kira felt uneasy, but she also felt she had to see this through. She checked the charge on her phaser and told the computer to proceed to the destination.

As the turbolift lowered, and kept lowering, she thought of the possibility that the man could be a changeling and that she could be walking into a trap. But it didn't make a whole lot of sense. Why her? The man seemed to want her to follow. A changeling on the station could find a lot more damaging things to do than leading the first officer into the lower levels. Of course, it could be out to replace her, and that could be devastating to DS Nine, just as it nearly had been when one replaced Bashir. But why the outfit? It was conspicuous on the Promenade. Why would a changeling want to be conspicuous?

Finally, the lift stopped and Kira edged out, phaser drawn. The corridor was dimly lit by emergency lights. This was one of the last levels before the unused sections just above Reactor Four. She heard a sound to her left and spun around just in time to see the striped cap disappear down a shaft. The man was going lower.

Kira thought maybe she should call someone to let them know where she was going, what she was doing, but she didn't. She didn't know why she didn't. She just didn't. Something about that man's eyes had caught her and she wasn't ready to be let go or even distracted. She would follow.

She peered down the shaft and caught a flash of material about two decks down. She wasn't sure how she saw it. There was no light down there, and she didn't have a palm beacon. Deciding on a little bit of caution at least, she kept her phasor ready in her hand. Then she began the climb down.

She climbed slowly though she felt her heartbeat quicken in her chest. She feared she would lose him in the darkness and the time it took to reach the level he was on. She wasn't even sure how far she'd gone. She could see up the shaft to the light she'd left, but below her was only darkness. She counted each rung of the ladder and when she estimated she'd gone two levels, she reached out a foot to test for a landing. When she didn't find one below her, she used one hand to test above. She moved down three more rungs and tried again with her foot. This time, she found the floor.

Cautiously, she stepped off the ladder onto the darkened level where she'd last seen the man in stripes. The darkness was oppressive, heavy on her shoulders and cold on her arms. She kept her phaser in front of her with one hand and followed the wall with the other. She searched her memories of the camp, of the night she beamed down to Auschwitz to look for Bashir. She'd gone into his barracks, seen the faces of the many of the men there. One in particular, high on one of the slats they used for beds. But it wasn't this man. She thought for sure she would have recognized those eyes.

From around a corner, up ahead and to the right, he emerged. And Kira knew he wasn't a changeling then. There was still no light, no reason why she should have seen him, but there he was. She didn't know what he was, maybe a vision, maybe a Prophet? She lowered the phaser and he motioned to her to follow him still. He slipped back around the corner and there was, once again, nothing to see.

She kept her steps short and didn't pick her feet up off the ground very high. This area of the station had been ransacked by the Cardassians and never really repaired. Pieces of equipment had been cannibalized here and there to repair other, more necessary parts of the station. She knew there could be debris on the floor and didn't want to risk falling. She reached the point where the man had disappeared again and her hand found the corner. She turned and saw him up ahead. This time, there was light though she could not see any source for it. The man himself seemed to be the source as the light played out in a circle around him, reaching no further than a meter in any direction. He was perhaps fifty meters down the corridor ahead of her. This time, he didn't move or turn a corner. He just stood, waiting.

She stood, too, uncertain of her approach. Who was he? Or what was he? The Prophets, she knew from Captain Sisko's descriptions, spoke in cryptic riddles. But at least they spoke. This man had yet to say a word. Other things didn't fit. She was on the station, her station. Of that, she was certain. Prophet visions we never so stable as her trek to this level had been. A vision would have transported her from one dream-like rendition of a familiar place to another and back again. And Prophets usually assumed the appearance of someone a person knew. She had not seen this man before. She'd seen men like him, but she was sure she didn't remember his face from her one night in that camp.

She'd already ruled out changeling. Changelings didn't emit light when taking the form of a human. And Quark hadn't seen him. Changelings could change their shape, but they couldn't appear as one thing to one person and something else--or nothing at all--to another at the very same time. So what did that leave? An hallucination? She had no reason to be hallucinating. She hadn't fallen or hit her head; she wasn't ill. And why a man from Auschwitz? Why not someone from her own experience? An apparition? Humans didn't like to admit that such things existed, but Bajorans weren't as closed-minded on the topic. Kira didn't discount the notion. But she didn't put the phaser away either.

The man beckoned her forward with his hand. He kept glancing at the wall to his right. His circle of light didn't reach far enough to let her see what he was looking at. She took a breath and stepped forward. She still walked slowly, but the man waited patiently, still casting wary glances at the wall. As she approached, he stepped closer, so that his light illuminated the lower section of the wall. He knelt down and touched what she could now see was a power transfer conduit cover. Then he stood again and stepped back a bit, giving her room. The light, however, stayed on the conduit cover, though he remained visible.

She was close to him now, just barely farther than her arms could reach. She thought of trying to touch him, to see if he was touchable. But she couldn't think of an excuse to do so that didn't sound awkward. And she still couldn't bring herself to break the silence that had existed between them.

He nodded to her again and she knelt down where he had been. She expected maybe sabotage. This spirit or vision or whatever he was was warning her of some impending danger. It was the only plausible reason she could think of for pointing out this conduit. Like all the others in this section, it was unusable, destroyed by the Cardassians during their retreat. She looked back at him. His eyes told her to open the cover. She wasn't sure how he conveyed that message; she just knew that that was what he wanted. Her mind whirled with the possibilities of what she could find there. A bomb. Parasitic devices like the Dominion used on the _Defiant_. A vole's nest. She wasn't sure she wanted to open it. If it were a threat, she should call O'Brien down there with the appropriate gear to deal with it. She hadn't even brought a palm beacon. How could she hope to be prepared?

Still, she felt she could trust him, and again, she had no rational reason why. Maybe because he had been a prisoner in that awful place, a fellow sufferer of unspeakable oppression. Or he at least took the form of one.

She held her phaser tightly and gripped the top edge of the cover. She pulled and the cover slipped off. But there was no threat. No explosives, no colorful, worm-like devices, no voles. Just a conduit. A perfect conduit. There were no loose wires, no shards of metal alloy, no spent rods. Had the usually detail-oriented Cardassians missed one when they were ransacking this level? No, there was one thing missing.

Dust. There was no dust. She looked at the floor before her knees. No dust there either. She turned her head and found seven years' worth of dust around her. But not in this place. This was recent. Someone had repaired the conduit. But why? And why did it matter to this glowing apparition? She decided to ask him, to break the silence. But when she turned her head, the light winked out and she was left in darkness. Alone.

* * *

Bashir had found his center back in the Infirmary. He could push Sisko and his words aside and concentrate only on his patient. He looked down at Mtingwa who was sleeping fitfully on the biobed. She'd worsened during the night, but not enough that Girani had felt the need to disturb him. She looked different to him somehow. Lighter, but not in a sense of weight. He'd been running scan after scan to try and pinpoint the problem. He kept the word "subspace" in the back of his mind.

He read over Girani's report from the night shift. There was nothing unexpected there. Mtingwa's condition had worsened. She was on life-support now. Her lungs had ceased to function on their own. Her pulse was steady but very weak. Her blood pressure had dropped dangerously low. She was dying. Bashir didn't expect her to last the rest of the day. And there was nothing he could do to help her.

"How is she?" a voice said, startling Bashir.

Bashir spun around to find Garak standing behind him. He nodded to the biobed. "Will she live?"

Bashir resented the intrusion. And he didn't want to voice his pessimistic prognosis in front if his patient, unconscious or not. She might be able to hear. "Can I help you with something?" he asked instead.

"Why, lunch, Doctor!" Garak exclaimed, though he kept his voice respectfully low. "You haven't forgotten again?"

"Garak--," Bashir started to protest.

"Now, I'll have no excuses, Doctor," Garak insisted. He reached out, took Bashir's arm, and began pulling him toward the door. "You do have to eat. Your patient is sleeping. She's not going anywhere. I'm sure your staff will notify you immediately if you're needed. You cannot sacrifice your own health."

Bashir shook his arm free. Garak had never been that forceful before. It was odd. Still, he couldn't just get out of lunch. He was hungry, and it was their habit to share lunch once a week. He hadn't told Garak he wasn't willing to do so anymore. He wasn't even sure he wasn't willing to do so anymore.

"Jabara," Bashir called out. "I'll be in the Replimat. Call me if anything changes."

"Yes, Doctor," Jabara replied, coming to the door. "Have a nice lunch."

Garak seemed to be in a particularly good mood as they strolled down the Promenade toward the restaurant. Bashir wasn't sure why they were walking so slowly. Garak knew he had a patient to get back to.

"You reacted strangely," Garak suddenly said, "to our luncheon last week. I didn't mean to upset you."

"It--" Bashir began, unsure of how to proceed. He didn't want to talk about last week. He didn't want to go to the Replimat either, for that matter. "It's nothing."

"Oh, I doubt that," Garak said. "I doubt that very much. It's quite something. However, I'm not sure what to expect from it."

Bashir's legs stopped moving. He hadn't meant to stop. His heartbeat began to pound in his ears.

Garak noticed and moved back to him. "Come, Doctor. People will wonder what it is that has upset you. And people can't know that, can they?"

Bashir shook his head. No, they couldn't. But still, he couldn't move. The Promenade began to swim around him.

Garak just nodded. "So what will you do about it?"

"I can't do anything," Bashir breathed.

"And what about me?" Garak asked. "What do you think of me?"

Bashir thought about that. He'd told Sisko that Garak was just following his nature. It was true. Garak had done many terrible things and still Bashir had befriended him. He'd been a spy, an assassin. He'd tried to commit genocide against the changelings. What he'd done with Sisko was nothing new. And nothing immoral in Garak's Cardassian code of ethics. But did that make it right? Yes, for Garak, but what about for him? How could Sisko be guilty and Garak be innocent of the crime that both had committed? Garak had found the forger. Garak had found the data rod. Garak had killed the forger and planted the bomb on the senator's ship. Garak had done the killing. But he'd killed before. He'd killed before and Bashir had still stood by him as a friend. He'd even forgiven him. He'd visited him when he'd been sentenced to six months for his attempt against the Founders. He'd never once broken off his lunch engagement. But did that make it right?

"Well?" Garak prompted.

"I don't know!" Bashir blurted, which stopped the Promenade from spinning. "I don't know how to take you."

Garak watched him for a moment. "Now that wasn't too hard, was it?" he said. "Come, the Replimat will be full if we don't hurry."

Garak walked on and after a few seconds, Bashir followed. He knew less how to take Garak than he did two minutes before. Then he realized that was a familiar feeling when it came to Garak.

Garak didn't speak again until they reached the Replimat. Strangely, he ordered an onion. Nothing else. Bashir ordered a salad and they found a table.

Garak still didn't speak after they'd sat down, and Bashir was at a loss. He took a bite of his salad and waited.

Garak didn't disappoint him. "The onion is a very interesting vegetable, wouldn't you say, Doctor?"

This was their old game. The game that had started the day they met. Garak wasn't interested in the onion. He was passing information. Of course, these days, it was what was expected of him. He had no reason to hide anything. Bashir suspected Garak meant it purely for his own amusement. Fair enough. "Well, it does have some medicinal value," he said, playing along. "Though not much."

Garak smiled and began to peel off the outer skin. "Some vegetables are merely two dimensional: outside and in. But this. . . ." He peeled off a layer of the onion and set it aside. "This has layer upon layer."

Bashir puzzled over it for a moment, but the answer simply wouldn't come to him. What had the onion to do with anything? Mtingwa? No, nothing seemed to correlate there. The war? Well, no. This sector had been quiet recently. The Dominion's experiment and Doctor Pfenner?

Garak offered a hint. "I intercepted an interesting message today. It appears to have been a bit delayed as it was sent the day before yesterday from somewhere in the Brayat system. It was intended for the Millani system."

That had to be Pfenner. But what did the onion have to do with it?

Garak peeled back another layer.

Pfenner--or his changeling counterpart--had been working on a three dimensional model of subspace. Garak had mentioned dimensions. "Layers!" Bashir said, suddenly understanding. Onions had layers, and so did subspace! That must have been what Pfenner was onto. Bashir pushed back from the table, forgetting the salad. "Thank you for the lunch, Garak."

When he reached the Infirmary, he immediately put a call through to the Aranus Institute. A gray-haired man answered, "To whom may I direct your call?"

"I'd like to speak to the director, please."

"Whom shall I say is calling?"

Bashir tried to hide his impatience, but his fingers drummed rapidly on the desk. "Doctor Julian Bashir, Chief Medical Office of Starbase Deep Space Nine."

"Just a moment."

He glanced over to his patient while he waited. She seemed lighter still. He walked over to her bed and noted the display above her head. He tapped a few controls and her weight was displayed. She'd lost over ten kilograms. She didn't look any lighter in the sense of weight. She just seemed, well, less there.

"I have the director for you, Doctor." the man called out. "Are you still there?"

Bashir returned to the communications console. "Yes, put her through, please."

The picture changed and the director, a Millanine female, appeared. "How can I help you, Doctor?" Her voice quivered a bit and Bashir wasn't sure if that was due to her species or her age. He'd never met a Millanine.

"I'd like a copy of Doctor Pfenner's recent work," Bashir told her.

"Your Lieutenant Dax already requested copies of Doctor Pfenner's notes."

Of course. Dax had been assigned to Pfenner's work. Still, he wanted more than notes. He wanted the onion. "But I don't believe she requested the model itself." He had no idea if Dax had or not, but the moment was here and he didn't want to wait to ask her.

"No, she didn't," the director confirmed. "But why would you want that? That was the changeling's work."

"It would help immensely," Bashir tried. "Could you send it over?"

"Well, yes, I don't see why not."

"Thank you," Bashir told her, grinning. "I'll be waiting for it."

The director nodded. "Good day, Doctor."

The screen went blank and Bashir called Jabara over and told her to contact him when it arrived.

* * *

O'Brien went over the scan again. How could the fragment have decreased in mass in the last four hours? He knew it was disintegrating slowly, but it still looked the same. It hadn't moved since the night before. It was just a fragment of metal, a shard. The thought had occured to him, when he first noticed the weight had changed, that it could somehow be a changeling, but it had been left alone all night without incident. One would think a changeling would be bored sitting in a little glass dish in a lab. Besides, he'd cut off a part of it, and it had not changed. Just metal. Only lighter now than it was before.

O'Brien's communicator chirped. He tapped it once to acknowledge the call. "Chief," Bashir's voice, a lot more like O'Brien remembered, came over the line, "can you meet me at Quark's?"

"Now?" O'Brien asked. It was lunchtime, yes, but Bashir was supposed to be eating with Garak right now. What was he doing in Quark's?

"Yes," Bashir replied. "I think I'm on to something. Please hurry. And if you see Dax, bring her along."

Dax? This was no darts game. "Alright. I'll be right there." O'Brien recorded again the fragment's weight and the time at which it was taken. He'd be checking that again when he returned. He secured the lab and headed for Quark's. He called Ezri on the way.

"What's wrong, Chief?"

"Nothing," O'Brien reassured her. "At least I don't think anything's wrong. Julian said he was on to something."

"How did he sound?" she asked.

"Like he was on to something," O'Brien replied. "I think that's worth looking into."

"Well, yes," Ezri agreed. "It's been awhile, hasn't it?"

Quark's was busy, but Bashir was waiting by the door. "Did you see Ezri?" he asked, not even bothering to say hello.

"I'm right here," she called out as she came up behind them. "What's all the excitement about?"

"An onion," Bashir said, and then he turned into the bar. "Quark, I need a holosuite."

_Onion?_ O'Brien worried that his friend had finally cracked. He shared a confused look with Ezri and then followed Bashir.

"They're all booked up," Quark told them. "You'll need to make a reservation."

"No time," Bashir said. "We'll have to borrow Vic's." Then he was off up the stairs.

* * *

Ezri followed still in a blur. O'Brien's call had come not three minutes earlier. Julian certainly did seem to be on to something. The crowd in the bar didn't seem to phase him at all. He looked energized even. He rushed up the steps two at a time and barely slowed as he approached the holosuite.

The doors to Vic's opened and Vic waved from the stage. The three of them went to the bar to wait for the end of the song. For his part, Vic wrapped it up quickly and then told the band to take five.

"They might need to take more than five," Bashir said, but he gave no further explanation for what they were doing. 'Onion' hadn't told her much.

"Julian!" Vic exclaimed. "Man, are you a sight for sore eyes!" He grabbed Julian's shoulders and pulled him into a hug.

Julian pushed back. "Thank you, Vic, really, but I don't have time right now. I haven't come for a visit. I need to borrow your bar."

"My bar?"

"Something about onions," O'Brien offered, tossing up his hands.

"Onions?"

Julian's badge chirped. One of his nurse's spoke. "The file has arrived, Doctor."

Julian sighed. "I need to run a simulation--"

"Of an onion?" Vic added.

Julian shook his head. "That was just the inspiration. Please, all of the other holosuites are taken. You're welcome to stay. I just need to borrow it."

Vic looked to Ezri and his expression asked if Julian was sane. Ezri shrugged and gave him what she hoped was a reassuring smile.

"Okay," Vic decided. Suddenly the lights in the bar blinked out. The crowd began to panic. "It's alright, folks. Power's out. Nothing to worry about. The engineers think it'll be an hour or two before they can get us up and running. If you'll just follow the emergency exit signs, you'll all be fine."

Ezri turned to Julian while the crowd filtered out. "Okay, what's with the onion?"

"Garak," he told her. "He was trying to tell me something."

"Well, it's not like we don't know he's cracking those transmissions," O'Brien interjected. "Why the use of vegetables?"

"He likes being cryptic," Julian offered as an explanation.

Well, that was certainly true. But it didn't explain the onion. "So," Ezri prompted. "Onion?"

"You'll see," he said. And then quieter, "I hope."

Finally, the crowd was gone. "Okay, pallie," Vic said, rejoining them. "The place is all yours."

"Thank you," Julian said. Then he tapped his comm badge. "Please route it to this holosuite. I'll run it from here."

"Yes, Doctor," the nurse replied.

Vic's bar winked out of existence and another simulation took its place. Ezri found herself standing on nothing.

"Whoa, pallie!" Vic exclaimed. "Where's the floor?"

Black space surrounded Ezri and the others, reaching out in every direction. There were stars. "Space," she said.

"This is what space is like?" Vic had grabbed hold of O'Brien's shoulder, but his voice was filled more with wonder now than fear.

"Subspace," Julian corrected, and Ezri realized now that this had something to do with Pfenner.

"Where's the onion?" Vic asked.

Julian shook his head. "I've never seen this before," he said. "We'll just have to wait and see."

They didn't have to wait long. Translucent blue lines formed around them in concentric circles expanding outward.

Another set of lines materialized, intersecting the blue ones at several points. "Okay, that I recognize," Ezri called out. "Chroniton waves."

"Layers!" Julian exclaimed. "We only assumed it was the changeling who was working on the model. What if it was Pfenner, himself? What if they took him because of the model?"

"Very good, Doctor." Everyone spun around to find Garak in the doorway. "I knew you'd work it out."

"What did the message say, Garak?" Julian asked. "What was it about the layers?"

"Well, it was a bit garbled," Garak began.

"But what did it say?" Ezri asked, growing impatient herself. They _were_ on to something.

"'Nearly successful,'" Garak recited, "subspace . . . distorted signal . . . unknown layer . . . aborted'"

"Nearly successful," Julian repeated, turning back to the model.

"The experiments?" O'Brien suggested. "Like with Mtingwa. They sent her ship off somewhere, maybe to one of these layers. The ship was supposed to send a signal back to its base or receive one from it. That would explain the comm system. But it didn't work. So it was set to self-destruct."

"Only it didn't," Julian added. "But I think you're right. Layers would work. They could be sitting right beside us and we'd never know."

"But it would have to be the right layer," Ezri said. She was starting to understand. "Mtingwa said she saw the base, but as if it was transparent. She was in a different layer, just not the right one. Her ship tried to self-destruct. The transmission didn't go through."

"So which one is the right one?" Julian asked. "And which one did she hit?"

"Chroniton waves!" O'Brien blurted. "Good God! Science lab." He turned and headed out before anyone could question him. Ezri and Garak followed.

"Thank you, Vic," Julian threw back as they left the holosuite. "You can have your bar back now."

* * *

They reassembled back in the science lab, where O'Brien was analyzing the shard from the ship. "It's lost weight again," the Chief said.

"What?" Bashir hadn't expected that at all. "What do you mean it's lost weight?"

"Just sitting here," O'Brien said. "It lost mass. It's the same size. There's just less of it here."

Where he'd been rather elated by their discoveries, he now felt the floor had fallen out from beneath his feet. He had to sit down. "What about the chroniton waves?" he asked, hoping O'Brien had different thoughts than the ones he was having.

"I think Mtingwa's ship hit one of the intersections," O'Brien explained. "There were some chroniton particles here when I first analyzed the fragment. But they've dropped off. They're gone. And now the fragment is going, too."

Ezri came around to stand in front of Bashir. "Are you alright, Julian?"

"Mtingwa lost weight," he told her. "I thought she looked lighter. Lighter, not smaller. There was just less of her."

"They're going back," Garak surmised, and Bashir realized he'd forgotten the Cardassian had come along. "The ship did self-destruct. The chroniton wave only delayed it."

Bashir shook his head, not wanting that answer. "But she's there, in the Infirmary. It's been days, a week or more since she was found."

O'Brien sat down beside him. "I'm sorry. I only thought about the ship, the metal."

It made sense. It made terrible sense. Mtingwa was dying because she died in her ship when it self-destructed. "What's the rate of decay?" he asked, and his voice felt hollow in his head.

"It's increased," O'Brien answered softly. "I figure the whole thing will be gone in five or six hours."

By evening, Caldia Mtingwa would be gone. Would he even remember? Would any of them? Would they forget then what they'd just learned? Her ship, her experiences helped them to put the pieces together. Would her death be in vain? Did she have to die? "Can we stop it?"

"I wouldn't know how," O'Brien admitted. "She was never really here."

"That's how she burned," Bashir said, letting his thoughts out. "She burned inside the suit. Because the ship blew up." The mystery's excitement had left him. Now there was just his patient. Caldia Mtingwa, a person, with memories and thoughts and loved ones. "I need to return to my patient." With that, he left them to deal with subspace layers and Doctor Pfenner. He didn't have to solve the whole puzzle. He only had to be a doctor.

* * *

Ezri watched him go. She felt for him. Jadzia had, too. When he lost a patient, he lost a bit of himself, if only for a time. Sometimes it was just that he put too much pressure on himself to save even the ones that couldn't be saved. That became clear to her after his enhancements were revealed. But sometimes it was just that he cared that much.

"Are you sure?" she asked the Chief, though the part of her that held Jadzia's memories felt sure of it as well.

"There's one way to be certain," O'Brien suggested, not sounding any happier than Julian had. "The _Potemkin_ found her. They could go back and look again."

"To see if there's debris," she finished for him. "More than there was before."

"I figure it would take them at least a day to get back there," O'Brien said. "By then, there should be enough to detect."

* * *

Bashir sat and watched her sleep. He'd done everything he could for Mtingwa. Everything except tell her the truth. There was still a little more time for that. She had to be awake to hear it. She'd been moved to one of the rooms at the back of the Infirmary, a quieter place with less traffic than the main room. It was more obvious now. She was less opaque than before. Bashir could almost make out the shape of the biobed beneath her.

It was so pointless. Life. Breathing. What good had it done Mtingwa to be found only to die? What good had it done for him to be found? So now he had light. And with light he'd seen death. Death on the _Enterprise_, death on Carello Neru, and now death on DS Nine. So now he had people around him. People who betrayed him, people who couldn't be trusted to live up to their principles, people who looked to him for help he couldn't give, people who died. What good was that? For every breath he took in freedom, his heart received another reason to hurt. Or another potential reason.

Even here. Even in his Infirmary. This was his refuge, the last vestige of who he used to be, the universe he used to live happily in. And it was just as painful as the world beyond it.

Mtingwa stirred and opened her eyes. She drew in a labored breath and then brought one hand up to rub at her eyes. "I can't see you," she said, with more breath than voice. "Not clearly."

"It's not your eyes," Bashir told her, taking her hand. She felt solid enough. "What else do you see?"

She turned her head, looking around the room. "Black, like it's hiding behind the walls."

_Space,_ he thought. He had to clear his own throat to speak again. "What about your ship?"

She looked at him, her eyebrows drawn down in confusion. Then she dropped her eyes lower to her side and they widened. She looked down toward her feet and reached her other hand out as if to touch something. "It's there," she said, and she gripped his hand tighter. "Why am I seeing that?"

Bashir took a deep breath, as if that would help anything. It wouldn't help her. It wouldn't help him, not really. He didn't feel any better having taken it. "I--" he began and found that he couldn't start there. "We found something, something to explain your condition."

She looked at him, at his eyes. "Explain it," she said, "not cure it."

"I can't cure it," he admitted. "It's not a disease. It's not even an injury to heal. I wish it were."

"I'm dying?" Her voice broke. "How?"

She deserved to know. "When the Dominion put you in that ship and sent you off, they were trying to reach a particular layer of subspace. One where they could see and contact this layer. They got close with you. You could see the base. But the ship was supposed to exchange a signal with the base. The ship was programmed to self-destruct if the signal didn't go through."

"But it didn't destruct," she pleaded. "I survived."

The display above her head began to beep. Her heart rate and respiration were too high. Still he couldn't not tell her. "It did," Bashir said. "The layer you reached intersected with a chroniton wave. You've been suspended in time. You're really still there, in that one moment before the ship destroyed itself."

A tear slipped from her eye and ran down toward her ear. "And now? I'm seeing the ship around me, space beyond--"

"Because you're going back there." The beeping grew more insistant. He reached for a hypospray beside the bed.

"No!" she cried. "Don't sedate me."

Bashir shook his head. "It will only calm you."

"I'm going to explode," she argued, "why should I be calm?"

"Because your lungs can't take it, and neither can your heart."

"Wouldn't it be better to die here?" she asked

"I'd have to try and revive you," he told her. "This way you have a little time."

Her heart rate began to slow, not by much though. "Time for what?"

Bashir pulled over the portable comm panel. "To say good-bye. We can call your family, or you can record something."

"How long?" she asked. The panel still beeped but the beeps were coming farther apart.

"A few more hours." He held up the hypospray again. She nodded and he administered the drug. Her heart rate slowed immediately and her breath came more evenly. But the tears flowed faster now.

"I'd like to be alone," she told him, nodding toward the comm panel.

"Of course," he said, standing. He moved to the door. "If you need anything. . . ."

"Will you be there?" she asked just as he'd reached the door. "When. . . ."

Bashir nodded and left.

* * *

Sisko sat back and let the others discuss O'Brien's report. Sometimes it was easier not being in command. Admirals outranked captains. He'd let them sort it out. He'd already accepted it. It made sense. How many pilots, like Mtingwa, had been lost out there, one layer away from what they knew as reality? Or more. Pfenner hadn't finished his model. They didn't know how many layers there were.

If it wasn't for Mtingwa, they might never have discovered what the Dominion was up to. Her ship, her story, was the key. Without her, they'd still be trying to figure out why the Dominion wanted all that dilithium and they might not have had any reason to connect that mystery to Pfenner's disappearance. And she was just a fluke. She was never meant to survive. She never really had.

Temporal Investigations had had to be brought in on this one. Was she here? Was she not here? Would anyone remember her once she'd reverted back to the point where time, for her, was suspended? Without her, would they remember anything they'd discovered? Would they be unable then, to stop the Dominion from testing it on more and more pilots?

K-Layer Subspace Concealment. That's what they were calling it now. Now that they had solved the puzzle, intelligence on the theory was popping up all over the place. The Cardassians had dreamed this up during the Klingon wars, though they had lacked the resources to even test it. Why that hadn't come out until now, Sisko wasn't sure. Though he did have a suspicion. Section 31 could perhaps have been interested in the technology themselves. By keeping it quiet, they kept others from catching on. It was obvious they had advanced technology they didn't share with the rest of the Federation. They were able to beam Bashir away even though the station's shields had been up. It wouldn't be beyond them to want to keep K-layer concealment to themselves.

But would they let the Dominion come so close to getting it? He didn't know the answer to that one. He'd never actually dealt with them himself, except for that brief moment on the _Enterprise_ when they'd captured Sloan. He really only knew about them through Bashir.

Bashir. Always his thoughts came back to Bashir. _Damn it. Enough!_ Sisko had spent the last three weeks wallowing in guilt, kicking himself for what he'd done to Bashir and the Romulans and Deyon III. He'd let it distract him from his duties and from his family. That was enough. Yes, he'd done wrong. But punishing himself over and over wasn't going to change anything. The past was the past. He could only try to make up for the past. He had to live with the present and work toward the future.

And Bashir would have to learn to live with that as well. Traumatized or not, he had a job to do, and his job included being under Sisko's command. Sisko made up his mind to have another talk with Bashir once the admirals had decided what to do with K-Layer Subspace Concealment.

* * *

Ezri thought they were having a good, productive session. Julian had been glum when he came in. He was still glum. She didn't expect that would change. Mtingwa would be dying soon. He had that to carry with him. Still, they'd talked about a lot of things, things he'd never really talked about before. Auschwitz, for example. It had seemed he was afraid to discuss that after he was rescued. Maybe he thought the Dominion would hear about it and use it. He said the changeling had told him they could learn from the place. That was reason enough to try and keep it quiet. But it hadn't helped him. He talked about the cave and how he'd occupied his mind taking apart walls and machines.

And he talked about the Dominion camp, 371. She'd heard about it from Worf, of course, but he'd only been there a short time. Bashir had been there a month. And he'd just been released from solitary confinement when Worf was captured. She knew he carried too much pain around with him. He kept too much to himself.

She chuckled a bit, finally understanding. "You don't even know you're doing it, do you?" She let her voice become serious. "Or maybe you do."

He didn't admit to either. "Doing what?"

She hadn't really thought he would. "The same thing you've been doing all your life." She sat back in her chair and brought her hands together on her knees. "You're really quite brilliant," she said, meaning it. She _was_ impressed. "It's no wonder Garak was upset after the enhancements came out. He was jealous."

His face was a mask of confusion now, but she knew she had him. "What _are_ you talking about?"

Maybe he really didn't know he was doing it. Or maybe he was still doing it, hoping to throw her off. "You're so much better at keeping secrets than him," she explained, letting him know she wouldn't be misdirected. "He builds his life around being an enigma, but you--you hid your enhancements for nearly thirty years."

Anger flashed behind those dark, expressive eyes of his, and hurt. "Twenty," he corrected. "I didn't know about them until I was fifteen."

Ezri tossed up a hand. "That's still impressive. You've been doing it so long it's ingrained." She leaned forward again. "Either that or you see it as a tried and true method. Worked before, why not try it again?"

Confusion, anger, hurt. They were all there. And frustration, too. He repeated his earlier question. "What are you talking about?"

She didn't answer. Not directly. "A year ago you wouldn't say anything about Auschwitz. The only time you described the Jem'Hadar camp was in your report. I've never seen you so open."

He raised his voice. "Isn't that what you want?"

She ignored the outburst, unusual though it was. "When you first came here, people said you talked too much. About yourself. You were arrogant." It hurt to push him so hard, but he needed the pushing if he was ever going to let her help him. "You talked about yourself so much no one would have ever suspected you were hiding anything. Brilliant! Garak should take lessons."

"You think I'm hiding something now?" he asked, indignant. He stood up. "You want me to talk about things. I've been talking about them. Do you want me to be difficult?"

She stayed seated, but matched his intensity. "Yes! Yes, because Julian Bashir would be difficult."

"Are you insinuating that I'm not Julian Bashir?"

"I'm insinuating that you've changed."

"_You've_ changed, Dax," he threw back. "Things happen. People change."

Now they were moving in the right direction. "And that's what I want to talk about."

He threw up his hands and turned his back to her. "That's what we've been talking about. Auschwitz, Three Seven One, the cave, it's all part of that. Those are the things that happened."

She walked up behind him and touched his shoulder. "But not the changes. You will talk about the events, but not about you. Not really you."

"Well, then, I don't know what you want to hear!" he pleaded. This was hard for him; she knew that.

"I don't want to hear what I want to hear," she told him, softening her voice.

Now he chuckled. "And you think I have problems." A defense mechanism. She recognized it as such.

She laughed with him. "Yes! I think I have problems, too. I think we all have problems."

He didn't share the humor. "But me in particular."

She stepped around him so she could see his face. "You haven't been the same since you returned, Julian."

"Why should I be the same?" he breathed. "The universe isn't the same."

That was the honesty she'd hoped to provoke. "Because you're not happy the way you are."

Incredulous wonder lit his face. "There's a war on. People are dying. People are killing. After all that's happened to me, what do you suppose I should be happy about?"

He had something there. It was hard to tell people not to be depressed when depressing things happened. But there was always something positive to point to, even here. "You were rescued."

"I rescued myself," he said with some pride. "And I am happy I'm not still stuck in that cave."

Ezri shook her head. "Relieved maybe, but not happy." She took his hand, made him look at her. "Julian, you don't have to be happy all the time. But something's not right if you're never happy."

"I'm not 'never happy,'" he held, pulling free of her touch. "When I'm in the Infirmary, it's like everything falls away. All of it. I'm happy there."

"That's good," she said, glad he had something. "But what falls away? What's there before you walk into the Infirmary. That's what I want to talk about, Julian. That's what you need to face."

He turned away again, not saying anything. She waited, giving him time. He would talk. She knew it. But still, he said nothing. "Is it something that would keep you out of the Infirmary?" she asked, hoping to prompt him, but realizing that could be the fear that kept him from talking. "Is that why you won't talk about it?"

Julian's comm badge chirped. He turned back to her, but tapped it. "Bashir here."

Jabara's voice came over the other end. "I believe it's time, Doctor."

He might have been happy to be saved from his present ordeal, but she could tell by his face that wasn't so. She knew what time it was. Mtingwa was dying. She nodded, letting him go. "We'll talk later," she said.

Bashir took a few deep breaths--out of habit, he supposed--and entered the room. Mtingwa was actually transparent now. She looked like someone caught in the middle of a transport: there and not there at the same time. No, not caught. She was being beamed away in slow motion. It probably didn't even take genetically enhanced eyes to see the changes now. She was fading. The display above her head had been turned off before he met with Ezri. The instruments had gotten quite confused.

She smiled at him, though her lips quivered. "I had a good talk with my sister." Her voice was so quiet, Bashir doubted a natural human could have heard it. "My family hadn't had any news about me since I was captured. They didn't know if they'd ever see me again. She had a baby, my sister. And her two older children are in school now. They're twins. She says they look like me."

Bashir smiled and stepped further into the room. He pulled up a stool and sat beside her bed. "Then they must be beautiful children."

She smiled again. "You're a charmer," she teased. Then she grew serious. "I'm sorry about before. You were right. I'm glad I had the time. I'd wanted to talk to her so many times when I was a prisoner. I would talk to her anyway, just in my head. That helped."

Bashir understood that. "I took apart walls," he told her. "Walls and machinery, replicators, transmitters, transporters, everything I could think of."

She nodded. Then she drew in a long, shaky breath. "I'm afraid," she admitted.

He wanted to comfort her, to tell her there was no need, that everything would be fine. But it wouldn't. They both knew that. "I'm here," was all he could say. "I won't leave."

She faced him, but she squinted her eyes. "I can't see you anymore."

He picked up her hand, surprised to find it still felt solid. "I'm still here."

She squeezed his hand, and he could feel the pressure, the desperation. "Can you hold me?" Tears spilled past her eyes and ears to the pillow but left no wet spot there. "Is there enough of me left?"

His throat hurt and his own eyes stung. He helped her to sit up and sat beside her on the bed. He wrapped his arms around her and felt her arms lightly on his back. He could feel her heart beat as he held her, though it seemed he was holding air more than a woman. Her shoulders shook as she cried.

She didn't say anything for several minutes. Then suddenly, she pleaded with him. "Will you remember me?"

He still hadn't worked that out. "I'll try," he said. And then she was gone. His arms fell to the bed. There was nothing left.

But he did remember.

Caldia Mtingwa frantically searched the cockpit for something to shut off the countdown. Self-destruct. They'd thrown her out here to self-destruct. Out where? She wasn't sure where she was. She could see the base outside the ship, but it wasn't right. It was like a ghost image.

Fifteen seconds. The cockpit was nearly empty. No piloting controls, no operations console or tactical display. The only thing in there was the remote control receiver and a small communications console. She'd tried that already.

Five seconds. Her pulse pounded in her chest. She didn't want to die. Not like this. Not out here. Not anywhere. _Damn them!_ she thought. Is this where all the others had gone?

Three, two. . . . The ship rocked violently and she threw up her hands, instinctively trying to shield her face from the fire. But there was no fire. Not yet. The cockpit became chaos. Lights flashed around her, inside the cockpit and out. Then darkness. She couldn't see anything, but she thought her bones would rattle right out of the EV suit they'd put her in. The lights in the cockpit came back on. She tried to brace herself against the fuselage but she couldn't keep her arms up. The ship's nose seemed to waver and ripple, like liquid. Then came the fire. It engulfed her, and she screamed. She had the suit, but she could still feel the heat. She took a breath and the air burned her throat and lungs.

And then suddenly, it stopped. The fire dissipated, leaving her coughing. Each breath she drew in was hot and caustic. It smelled rotten, metallic. But it was all she had. She hurt, but she was still alive. The countdown had stopped. She hadn't even noticed the silence until she could stop coughing long enough to look outside the cockpit. No base, ghost image or not. There was nothing out there but stars.

She didn't care now that it hurt so much to breathe or move. She was alive. She waited to see if the Dominion would bring her back by remote control, but the ship didn't move. She was free. She'd take that. She could live with the pain.

She forced her fingers to move and reached for the communications console. It took her two hours, but she finally altered the signal to something resembling a Federation distress call. She hoped it resembled it enough.

She waited. She hoped the Dominion or its allies wouldn't pick up the signal. She didn't want to have to go back. Not after this. If she could just get to a nice, clean Federation ship. . . . Or even a cold, dark, harsh Klingon one. It didn't matter. She closed her eyes. She was tired, and it was getting harder and harder to breathe.

She awoke when the tingle hit her. For that briefest of moments, all her pain went away. Then she was whole again and the pain was with her. But she was in a bright room, on a soft bed. She'd made it. A face leaned over her, removed her helmet. "You're awake," the face said.

"Where am I?" she croaked out.

"You're on the _Potemkin._"


	5. Chapter Ten

**Star Trek: Deep Space Nine  
Faith, Part II: Forgiveness  
By Gabrielle Lawson**

**Chapter Ten**

Kira had waited for her shift to end. She still wasn't completely sure what she'd seen down in the lower levels. Oh, the conduit she was sure of. It was the man that still perplexed her. She'd spent nearly an hour during dinner trying to figure out how to tell someone without telling about the man who'd led her down there. And figuring out who to tell at all. O'Brien would be appropriate for the conduit. Maybe he'd had someone working down there. But that didn't explain the man. Only Bashir explained the man, because Bashir had once worn the same striped uniform. She didn't think she could go to him directly on this though. She wasn't sure it was him. And if it was, how would he react when confronted with it. She'd finally decided on Ezri. Ezri would be a better judge of Bashir's reaction and she might even listen to the part about the man with an open mind.

Kira touched the panel by Dax's door and waited for an answer. The door didn't open, but Ezri did answer. "Come in." She sounded tired.

Kira stepped forward and the door opened. She stopped there in the doorway, though. Ezri was facing her on the far wall. Upside down.

"Oh, hi!" she said, swinging her feet down. "I was just thinking."

Kira's brow furrowed. "On your head?"

"It's been that kind of day," Ezri answered without really explaining. She stood up and smoothed down the wrinkles in her uniform. "Is there something wrong?"

Kira shook her head and looked toward the couch. "I need to talk," she said, "about something that happened today, something that's been happening, I suppose."

Ezri held out a hand toward the couch, inviting Kira to sit. Kira moved quickly to it and Ezri sat with her, tucking a leg under her body. "What happened?"

"It's strange," Kira warned.

"I'm a woman of less than thirty years walking around with a slug that's over three hundred in my gut," Ezri admitted, smiling. "I can deal with strange."

Kira chuckled. Ezri always managed to lighten the mood when it needed it. "I suppose you can," Kira agreed. She took a deep breath and started the only place she could think to start. "I saw someone going into Quark's today."

Now Ezri's brow furrowed. "And that's strange?"

Kira shook her head. "Not just any someone. A man."

Ezri's eyebrows shot up.

"A man in a striped Auschwitz uniform," Kira added, stopping any light-hearted thoughts Dax might have had about Kira seeing a man.

Ezri's face darkened immediately. Jadzia had seen more of the camp than Kira had. "Auschwitz?"

Kira nodded. "I'm certain. He had the star on his chest, and a number. Lower than Julian's."

Ezri ran a hand through her short hair. "That's not possible." She stood up. "Julian is the only living survivor. The oldest living survivor from that time died in the early twenty-first century. Why would someone be wearing that kind of uniform in Quark's?"

"Quark didn't see him," Kira threw out. "No one else seemed to notice. He looked right at me from the upper level. But I was the only one who saw."

Ezri sat back down and looked at her carefully. "And you've been feeling okay?"

Kira shook her head and put up a hand. "I've already reasoned it all out. I didn't hallucinate him. I didn't even recognize him. Nor was he a changeling. He did things they couldn't do. He wasn't a Prophet, at least he didn't act at all like Captain Sisko has described the Prophets behaving. Everything was real. He wanted me to follow. I followed."

"He told you that?"

"No," Kira said. "He didn't say anything. I just knew he wanted me to follow."

Ezri just nodded, but her lips were pursed together. "Where did he lead you?"

"Lower levels," Kira answered. "Section D. Two levels below anything we use, into the dark. Only I could see him. At first, I couldn't see anything but him."

"At first?"

"When we got there, to the place he was leading me to, there was light around him, like it came from him. He showed me a power transfer conduit, and left the light there, though he stepped away. I opened it, and it was perfect. Not one wire or connection was missing or out of place."

Ezri shook her head again. "I don't understand. We don't use those levels. They were never repaired."

"Exactly," Kira told her. "This one was. And it wasn't just missed by the Cardassians. I thought of that. There was no dust in it, or around it. Someone repaired it recently. Someone that knew a man in an Auschwitz uniform. Why else would he lead me there. He left as soon as I'd found it. Just gone. It took me an hour to find my way out in the dark."

"Julian?" Ezri asked, putting the pieces together just as Kira had. Who else had known such a man? Lieutenant Jordan had spent more time in the camp than any of the others looking for Bashir, but he'd been gone for nearly two years now and he hadn't stayed around to socialize with the prisoners. "You think the man was some sort of ghost?"

Kira felt her cheeks flush. Ezri was Starfleet. "I'm saying I don't know what he was," she returned with a bit more anger than she wanted. "I just know he wanted me to see the conduit, to know that someone had done it. To know who that someone was. Why else would he wear the uniform? It wouldn't mean anything to anyone but Julian. Forget the man, Ezri, think about Julian. Why would he be down there repairing power transfer conduits in the dark?"

Ezri stood again, blowing out a long held breath. "He took apart walls," she said finally, pacing a few steps away. "In his mind. He took apart walls and equipment. Stripped them back layer by layer when he was in the cave. It was how he passed the time, what kept him sane. It's a common enough coping tactic given long-term isolating conditions. I read a case study of a woman, a prisoner in the Viet-Nam Conflict on Earth in the twentieth century. She built houses from the ground up."

Kira understood that. Bajoran torture victims had done the same sorts of things to keep their minds occupied and off their torment. But she was still worried about Bashir. "So now he's doing it for real? In the dark."

Ezri nodded. "The cave was dark. He was there a long time. Maybe it became a comfort to him. It's quiet in the dark. It's probably chaotic on the station in comparison. It was on the _Enterprise_. He hasn't been out that long really. Less than a month. It makes sense that he'd go back to the dark. Was the conduit active?"

Kira shook her head.

"Then I wouldn't worry," Ezri said. "At least it's nothing dangerous, nothing we use. He can't do any damage without power and I think he's rational enough not to do anything dangerous anyway. He's probably just been doing it to calm the chaos. I'll talk to him though. Just not tonight. He lost Mtingwa tonight."

Kira felt better. She did trust Julian not to do anything dangerous to the station. And Ezri's reassurances made sense. "I heard," she said, replying to Ezri's remark about Mtingwa. "I'm not sure why we still remember her if she was never here."

Ezri sunk back onto the couch, looking morose again. "Apparently she was. And according to Temporal Investigations, she will be again. Over and over again."

* * *

It was late, and it wasn't the best time. Sisko realized that. But he just didn't feel it could wait any longer. He couldn't wait. He didn't want to face another staff meeting like the last two. He didn't want to avoid Bashir on the Promenade. He wanted to put an end to the power game they were playing. Maybe having lost a patient would cool Bashir's temper, making him more able to listen. Sisko expected a clipped reply or terse acknowledgement to his request. Instead, Bashir simply said, "Yes, sir." No tone, no harshness. Sisko started to doubt.

When he appeared in Ops, however, Sisko's resolve came back to him. Bashir's face was set hard, his eyes cold. He stepped through the door and stood at attention. "You wanted to see me," he said, and Sisko could still not identify the tone.

"Yes," he said. "I think we need to talk."

"We talked this morning," Bashir replied.

Yes, they had. "I know. But I don't think we resolved anything."

"There's nothing to resolve."

"I think there is," Sisko said. He stood up and braced his arms on the top of the desk. "I've spent the last three weeks thinking about what you said back on the _Enterprise._ And you were right. You opened my eyes to a lot of things." He folded his arms and turned to look out the viewport. "When does the line begin to fade? The line between good and bad, right and wrong? What if, in trying to win, we end up looking in the mirror and not recognizing ourselves?"

Bashir was silent behind him. Sisko could see him in the reflection. He'd moved to parade rest. He didn't relax at all.

"I'll admit," Sisko went on, "that I haven't even looked at that mirror since the war began. Not until I saw you on the _Enterprise._ Then I looked and I didn't recognize myself. I didn't like what I saw there. I've apologized, and I know that isn't enough for you, for anyone. It can't change what I did. But nothing can." He turned. It was enough. "I can't change the past, Julian. I can't go back in time and erase it." The words were out before he realized it. 'Back in time' was not exactly the best choice on this night.

"Can't you?" Bashir asked, his voice flat, matter-of-fact. "You can break the Prime Directive when it suits you and commit a felony when it's convenient. What's to stop you breaking temporal policy?"

"You," Sisko said, deciding not to take offense at Bashir's words. They needed to work things out, not argue more. "You. And me. You made me look in that mirror again. I don't have the right to decide for a whole quadrant which past and which future is right. We played it out the way we played it, right or wrong, it's done."

"So that's just it?" Bashir asked. His face had darkened. "We just forget about it now. Pretend it never happened?"

"No," Sisko said, stamping a hand down on his desk again. "No, but we go on. I got the message, Doctor, loud and clear. I don't need you to punish me anymore. I can manage that all by myself. From now on, we go back to being captain and lieutenant, commander and doctor. And maybe someday we can go back to being friends. But that's your decision. I won't force it, but I will enforce the chain of command. And I'll expect you to respect it."

Bashir straightened to attention. "Yes, _sir_."

Sisko knew he wasn't going to get more than that. He was surprised, actually, that he didn't get an argument. He nodded. "Dismissed."

* * *

Julian Bashir felt like his world--what was left of it--was collapsing. Ezri had him on one side, Sisko on the other. He couldn't go back to the Infirmary, not now. Not just yet. His shift had ended hours ago, thankfully. He told the turbolift to take him to the Habitat Ring. Then he changed his mind. Ezri might look for him there. He didn't want to talk to her. Or anyone else. He just wanted to disappear.

He found himself again in the lower levels, the same deck he'd visited now and then since his return. He knew his way by heart now. He didn't need to grope along the walls. Darkness was something familiar to him, something comforting. It hid everything equally: what one wanted to see and what one didn't.

He located his conduit and felt inside. It was ready. He only needed to tie it in to the EPS system. He took a cue from Jordan's clone and tapped into several dozen different nodes, taking just a bit of power from each. Each would only register the slightest margin of drop-off, not enough to cause alarm. It took hours to accomplish all the tie-ins. He had to move from one panel to another along the entire deck. But finally, he was ready. He found his way back to the conduit and connected the last piece of the circuit.

And the lights came on. Damn. The sudden light snapped at his eyes. He hadn't meant for that to happen. He opened the circuit again and the light faded. Someone might have noticed. It was simple when he thought of it. The lights had been on the whole time; they simply had no power. He had to find all the controls and disconnect them.

By the time he emerged from the lower levels, all the shops on the Promenade were closed. Except Quark's. But Quark's didn't close until the early hours of the morning. He passed by the upper level and noticed that the waiters were just cleaning up. Apparently, it was the early hours of the morning. He went on to the turbolift and headed back to his quarters.

He felt numb and hollow as he walked. Working below had done that for him. It was better than the hurt and anger he had felt before. It was the best he could hope for anymore.

He opened the door to his quarters and jumped when he heard the voice behind him.

"No more caffeine for you," Ezri said.

He spun around. "What are you doing here?"

She shook her head. "Shall we go in?" She didn't wait for him to answer but stepped past him into the room. He looked around, thinking of leaving again, but knew he couldn't explain that. He followed her.

She began as soon as the door closed. "When was the last time you slept?"

He'd barely made it into the room. He'd have to pass her to go anywhere. "Last night," he told her, without having to lie. He _had_ fallen asleep last night eventually.

She crossed her arms over her chest. "More than three hours?" she pressed.

He didn't answer. He didn't know the answer.

"So what do you do with all that spare time?" she asked.

Bashir felt the heat rising in his chest again. Why was she doing this? Why now? He glared at her. But she didn't stop.

Ezri had spent hours thinking after Kira had left. Not about Mtingwa. Those thoughts were too painful. She thought about Bashir, about the conduit, about the darkness and the chaos, about what Bashir didn't get to talk about in their last session. Each of those things, alone, were minor. He could endure, even thrive, as he had shown on the _Enterprise_ and earlier that night when he'd put the pieces together about Mtingwa and Pfenner. But together they told of the hurt he was feeling, of the despair he was trying to mask. He was good at it, too, masking it. He'd managed to get by an empath hiding it so well. She'd already told him how impressed she was with that. Her earlier accusation had been harsh, maybe too harsh. It was possible he didn't know how to cope any other way. Seventeen years was a long time to build a habit of hiding. He had to learn to heal. She had to show him how. No more hiding.

She faced him. "Do you sit and imagine taking apart the walls?" she asked, forcing herself to be strong. "Or do you really take apart the walls?"

He still didn't answer, but she had surprised him. His mouth popped open for just a moment.

"Where?" she pressed. She wanted him to admit it, to talk about it.

He turned away from her. He wanted a place to run, she guessed. She hadn't left him any room.

"The lower levels? That was your handiwork, wasn't it? The lights went on down there tonight. Ops registered it. That was you." She turned around, looking at the walls, the ceiling. The walls seemed different somehow, though she couldn't put her finger on any particular differences. "And here? What did you do here?"

"I won't tell you." Finally.

She turned back to him and sighed. She'd tried to give him time, but somehow tonight, she'd sensed he was running out of time. They'd finally managed to get somewhere in their sessions and he'd been called away. He was always being saved by something to keep from having to face what was hurting him. She wouldn't let it happen again. "Why?" she pushed. "In case I'm a changeling?"

His face flushed. "In case someone's listening in," he shot back.

He was angry. Well, maybe that would make him talk. "Julian," she tried, looking around again. She saw no listening devices or surveillance equipment.

"I want to feel safe in my own quarters," he told her, raising his voice. "I don't think that's unreasonable."

She faced him again. She lowered her voice. "Then why don't you?" she asked. "Why don't you feel safe here?"

"Why don't I?" He opened his arms and spun once around. "Why should I? We've been through this before." He took her arm, tight enough that his grip hurt, and pulled her to the bedroom. He pointed to the chair across from the foot of his bed before he let go of her arm. "Have you any idea how many times I've woken to find Sloan sitting in that chair? Or how about the time I woke up thinking I was in that bed when I was really in a holosuite? How about when I went to a medical conference and woke up on some god-forsaken asteroid? Why should I feel safe here?"

She wanted to hold him, to tell him he'd have no reason to fear. But he did. She couldn't change that. He was right. The station's security hadn't been able to protect him. Of course, he'd try to protect himself. Survival instinct was a hard one to fight. "I'm not saying you shouldn't be afraid, Julian," she tried, softening. "But you can't live like this."

"I can't live at all," he breathed, turning back to the living area.

She followed, hoping she hadn't heard right. Her heart ached for him, but she kept her head. She was his counselor, and a counselor was what he needed.

"I don't sleep," he told her, "because I can't see them coming when my eyes are closed. I don't try to stay awake; I just can't sleep. So I do things. I work on the walls. I don't work on them to stay awake. I work on them to fall asleep."

He hadn't repeated the words she'd feared, but he was giving her something. "Trying to make them safer?" she concluded in question.

He nodded, and she was curious as to just what he'd done to the walls in his quarters. But that wasn't important. "Let me help you!" she pleaded.

He turned on her. "How?! How can you help? How can you help me? Give me medication to make me sleep? Or maybe to make me feel like everything's okay when it isn't. You can't do any more than he can."

He? That threw her off. "Who?"

He turned away, squared his shoulders. He wouldn't answer that. She'd have to guess. It wasn't that hard. "The captain?"

His shoulders dropped but he didn't turn back.

"What can't he change? What happened?" But he was gone. Closed off. This is what he needed. This was the point he always managed to get out of talking about. Sisko. Something had happened between him and the captain that neither would talk about, something that was destroying the man before her. "Talk to me," she ordered, still softly but firm. She didn't want to threaten him, but he wouldn't even look at her. She took a big breath. "You have to talk to me," she said, "or I'll have to relieve you of duty."

He spun around, but he wasn't angry now. He looked terrified. "I can't," he pleaded.

His tone stabbed at her heart but she had to be resolute. He was using the Infirmary to escape from his problems when he needed to face them, to find a way through them. "You're destroying yourself," she countered. "You need a break anyway. You have been through a lot. And you just lost a patient."

"I've lost patients before," he tried, stepping closer to her. His eyes begged her. "I can't," he repeated.

She felt like she was kicking a puppy, but she held her ground. "You're relieved until further notice. I'm sorry. You know how to find me." She turned away from him and walked out the door. She waited until she got around the corner before she let herself cry. Then she called O'Brien.

* * *

O'Brien tapped the door panel, and thought about how he might get the door open if Julian didn't answer. He was surprised to find the door wasn't locked. He opened it and stepped inside.

The room was dark and it took a few minutes for his eyes to adjust, just like it had on the _Enterprise._ Ezri hadn't said anything except to go see Julian, so he wasn't sure what to expect. He'd gotten dressed and left immediately with Keiko's encouragement, and a strong cup of coffee.

Finally, his eyes adjusted enough to see the furniture, but not Julian. He stepped farther into the room. He crossed over to the bedroom and looked in. He worried for a moment that he might have woken him up, but he tossed that thought out. The door would have woken him. Besides, Ezri seemed sure he was supposed to come over.

He didn't see him in the bedroom, so he turned back to the main room. He was about to call for lights when he saw the man in stripes again. The hair on the back of his neck stood up. The man was standing just to the left of the main door. He was thin, very thin, and O'Brien knew where he'd seen those stripes before. On Julian. But this wasn't Julian. O'Brien wasn't even sure what this was, let alone who. The man pointed, and O'Brien followed with his eyes. There past the end of the couch was a leg. O'Brien turned back to the door, but the man was gone.

O'Brien shook off the goosebumps he'd gotten from the man and went to the end of the couch. Julian was slumped against the wall there. He had a med kit beside him. Open.

O'Brien knelt down beside him. He looked at the kit and tried to decide what was in there, but it was too dark to tell. "Julian? What's with the kit?"

Bashir didn't answer, but O'Brien could guess. He looked again. Nothing seemed out of place as far as he could tell. He was relieved, but not much. He'd been where Julian was sitting before. He'd had a phaser then.

Julian did speak eventually. "She relieved me of duty." His voice was quiet, almost a whisper. O'Brien remembered the tone. He'd used it when he told O'Brien of his enhancements and how he'd been a disappointment to his parents.

"Ezri?" O'Brien asked, bringing his mind back to the present. He decided that if he sat down beside Julian, he'd have to move the med kit farther way. He pushed it aside.

Julian didn't look at him. "Don't worry, Chief," he told O'Brien as he sat down. "I seem to be incapable of suicide. I could have. I was there, not two meters from the fence, but I just couldn't move forward. Not like Vláďa. I admire Vláďa."

He was jumping around so much, O'Brien had a hard time keeping track. But he supposed he'd done the same after Agrathi. So he tried. Fence, Vláďa, the guy at the door--though O'Brien couldn't figure out why in the hell he was the one who saw the guy at the door. These were things of Auschwitz. Vláďa, the Chief remembered, had committed suicide by putting himself on the electrified fence. What was there to admire? "He gave up, Julian."

Bashir shook his head, and his voice did hold admiration. "He didn't just give up. He didn't throw himself on the fence in some fit of desperation." He stood up suddenly and paced, acting out Vláďa's actions. "He folded his clothes and put them aside so that someone else could use them. Then he walked straight to the fence and lifted his arms to heaven in the hope that there was one and he touched it." He dropped his arms to his side. "He wasn't ashamed or hurried or desperate. But he ended it. He was stronger than me. Maybe you were, too, Miles." He slumped down onto the couch. "But I stopped you."

O'Brien used the arm of the couch to lift himself up. "I'm glad you did. It would have only made things worse. Keiko and Molly--"

Bashir interrupted. "Yeah, you have them."

This was not a talk O'Brien had ever figured he'd have with Julian. Julian was better at it. "You have people, too, Julian. You have your family. They're on Earth, but you have people here, too. You have me and Kira and all the others. Ezri, too. She only did what she thought was best. You relieved me of duty, too, remember? I hated you for it, but you were right to do it. You saved my life. It would only be worse if you died. Trust me, I know from experience."

"So do I, Miles, in a sense, and do you know what I remember?" Julian looked at him, waiting for an answer.

O'Brien was afraid of what he might say, but he knew Bashir had to say it. "What?"

"Nothing. No pain, no cruelty, no betrayal. . . . Just darkness."

O'Brien guessed he was talking about the cave, but he thought maybe Julian was leaving some things out, like dampness and cold and hunger. He wanted something positive, though, to counter Julian's negatives. "No joy," he decided. "There's joy in life, too, Julian, not just pain."

Bashir nodded and O'Brien thought maybe the dark moment had passed. But Julian wasn't finished. "But there is a point where the joy is overwhelmed, Miles, and I don't see it getting any better. I'm not just paranoid, you know. They _are_ all out to get me. The Dominion, Section 31. One thing after another. They're wearing me down. Hell, I _am_ worn down. I'm worn out. What is there left, Miles? What?"

Only one thing that mattered. "You."

"And what is that worth?" O'Brien heard his earlier words, spoken in this same room. _'Unnatural.' Meaning 'not from nature.' 'Freak' or 'monster' would also be acceptable._

It was worth more than O'Brien had ever managed to tell him. Julian was the best friend he'd ever have and probably ever would have. "Well, I for one, hold it in high regard. I don't get out of bed for just anyone."

* * *

"But you're not me." Julian sunk further into the couch. "I was a mistake from the moment I was born. Or from the moment they changed me. None of this would have happened if they'd let me just grow up." He wasn't sure why O'Brien had come when he did. And he wasn't sure why he was arguing with O'Brien now. Maybe because he wanted to hear the other side. Maybe.

"And I'd be dead," O'Brien pointed out. "And Kira and Dax and Worf and Garak. And thousands of others. And the children on Boranis III would still be dying."

"There would have been other doctors," Bashir held.

O'Brien shook his head. "Not as good as you. Not as dedicated as you."

"That used to be enough for me," he said before he could think of a reason not to. "But it isn't anymore. I want to be trusted. I want to trust, and I can't do that anymore."

"You are trusted," O'Brien argued back. "Trusting is your choice. You keep shutting people out. You think if you push people away, they can't ever hurt you. But in the end you just end up alone. It destroys you, in the end."

Bashir wished it was that easy. He'd let Miles in further than Ezri or Troi. But he wasn't afraid anymore. He'd already lost the one thing he'd still been afraid of losing. Being a doctor. "It already has."

"No," O'Brien said, facing him. "It hasn't. If it had, we wouldn't be talking right now. I know there's a lot of bad out there right now and it feels like it's all coming after you, but there are still good things out there, too. Maybe you can't see it now, but they always outweigh the other stuff. Good wins out in the end."

"When, Miles?" Bashir asked, looking at O'Brien for the first time that night. He really wanted to know. "I've tried to be good all my life. I'm not winning."

O'Brien smiled. "You're still here," he said. "You've survived everything they've thrown at you and you're still here and you're still good. You have won."

Bashir dropped his eyes. Why did he feel like he'd lost? Why did he keep losing? "But I don't want to fight anymore," he told the Chief. "I'm tired."

"So let us help you," O'Brien tried again. "You don't have to fight it alone. You're not the only good guy out there."

* * *

O'Brien took a deep breath and sighed. This was going to be hard, but it needed saying. "Look, Julian, I've always shied away from telling how I feel about you. I teased you when you came back from the Dominion. That was wrong. I shouldn't have. You're my best friend, Julian. My life isn't the same when you're not here. It's not just that it isn't as much fun. There's a piece missing. You are a part of my life. You are a part of my children's lives. You are a part of this station, a very important part, and I don't mean the Chief Medical Officer. You're our heart, Julian. Without you, the station dies. It turns and hums and Quark's is still open, but it's dead. That's what it was like when we thought you were gone. The station was dead."

Bashir looked at him as if he'd sprouted a second head. But there was something else there, something that told O'Brien he was getting through. So he didn't stop. "And I know there's something between you and Sisko that neither of you will talk about, but you're part of him, too. Ever notice how he always took your side when you and Worf would offer opposite opinions? He always went with you. You're his conscience. He needs you. We all need you. You can trust us. You're not alone."

* * *

O'Brien woke up when the computer chirped. His neck hurt and he rubbed it, trying to get the kink out. He was still on the couch, but Julian was gone. "The time is 0630," the computer reported. "Staff meeting in thirty minutes."

O'Brien got up and went to the bedroom to see if Julian was there. They'd talked long into the remainder of the night--or morning. Or rather, O'Brien had done the talking. Julian had stopped somewhere in the middle and just sat staring at the ceiling. Eventually, his eyes had closed and O'Brien let his own head fall back on the couch, too. He was afraid to leave Bashir alone, even while he slept.

But Julian wasn't in the bedroom either. "Computer, where is Doctor Bashir?" O'Brien asked.

"Doctor Bashir is in the Infirmary," the computer replied.

O'Brien wondered at that. He'd been relieved of duty. Had he forgotten?

* * *

Bashir finished the letter and downloaded it to the PADD. He checked the time. 0630. He had to hurry. The night nurse hadn't known he was relieved of duty. He told her he had to catch up on some paperwork before the staff meeting. She'd left him alone. But Jabara would be in soon, and the news would be known.

He stopped for a moment and looked back at the Infirmary, his Infirmary, his home. He remembered the Lethean and how he'd stopped him here, in what was for him, the heart of the station. He should have died then, when he was still innocent of all the evil in the universe.

He said a silent good-bye to the place and turned away.

A few people looked up when he reached Ops, but their heads dropped again. It wasn't unusual to see him there. No one questioned him when he walked up to Sisko's office. He checked first, quickly looking through the windowed doors, to make sure that Sisko wasn't there. The doors opened. He stepped in and laid the PADD carefully on the center of desk.

No one paid any attention as he left Ops. He took a different path back to the Habitat Ring, well away from the rest of the senior staff's quarters. Except for Kira's. He went by hers and stopped in front of her door.

He touched the panel and waited for her to answer.

* * *

O'Brien reached the Infirmary but couldn't find Bashir there either. He asked the nurse on duty if she'd seen him, but she said he'd just missed him. He'd come in to do some paperwork before the meeting. That didn't add up. He didn't need to go to the meeting since he'd been relieved of duty. Apparently, this nurse hadn't heard. He asked her if she knew where Bashir was headed after he left.

"He didn't say," she told him. "But he did look unusually melancholy. Of course, I haven't seen him much since his return. I'm just going on memory. He was usually so cheerful."

"Yeah," O'Brien replied. "He was. Thanks. If you see him, tell him I'm trying to find him, will ya?"

"Of course."

O'Brien stopped by the information kiosk on the Promenade and asked the computer again where Bashir might be.

"Doctor Bashir is in the Infirmary."

O'Brien went right back, surprising the nurse. He went straight to Bashir's office and started opening cabinets and drawers. The nurse followed, becoming worried herself, by his behavior. He didn't explain, though, and kept looking. He found it in the medkit on his desk. O'Brien recognized the kit from the night before. Bashir's combadge rested between two hyposprays. O'Brien took it out and slammed the kit shut.

* * *

Kira didn't expect visitors at this time of day. She wasn't dressed yet. She'd only woken up ten minutes before. She was just finishing her breakfast. She supposed it had to be important if it couldn't wait for the morning staff meeting. She walked over to the door and pressed the panel to open it.

Julian was standing on the other side. He looked tired and there was a fine stubble beginning to be visible on his chin. His eyes held hers like the man's had in Quark's. He didn't say anything.

"What is it?" she asked, stepping aside so he could enter.

He didn't move from the doorway. "I just wanted to thank you," he said finally, quietly. "Thank you for believing in me, for keeping my post open. I won't be needing it now. Promise me that you'll find someone to fill it. You promised before."

Kira shook her head. "I did," she said. "But why--"

He took her hand. "Thank you," he repeated. "Good-bye." He released her hand and turned away down the corridor.

Kira started after him but she hesitated. She was still in her nightgown. "Julian!" she called, but he was already a few doors down. She raced back to her room to grab her robe and then headed out the door.

He was gone. "Julian!" she called out again.

A door opened. "Colonel?" Lieutenant Mubarak stepped into the corridor, still without his shoes. "Is something wrong?"

Kira looked down the corridor again, hoping to see him, or even the man in stripes. Nothing. "No," she told Mubarak. "It's nothing." She turned back and dressed quickly.

* * *

Bashir reached his own quarters without drawing attention. He almost felt like he was already gone, a ghost floating through the corridors that no one could see, that no one wanted to see. But he knew that wasn't true. He could be seen, for awhile yet. He paused before he went in and asked the computer where Chief O'Brien was.

"Chief O'Brien is in the Infirmary," the computer replied.

_Looking for me,_ Bashir finished silently. He'd have to hurry. The shuttle would be leaving before the staff meeting began without him. He packed only a few things. He'd already learned to live without most of his belongings. He looked at his device, his insurance policy to keep Sloan away. He placed it in the replicator and it disappeared. "Let them come."

* * *

Sisko turned the bacon and moved to put the bread in the toaster. He could hear Kassidy getting dressed in the bedroom. He was determined that today would be a better day. He would not let Bashir control his emotions today. He would not neglect his family.

"Do you want eggs with your toast?" he called out.

"Sunny side up," she answered. "Have you seen my boots?"

He started to tell her they were under the bed, but his stomach felt like it flipped. A light flashed before his eyes and he felt dizzy for a moment. He closed his eyes until it faded, grabbing the edge of the table for support. When he opened them again, he knew he was having a vision. Only this time, the Prophets weren't using familiar faces. "You need him," the Prophet said. His voice was accented. He wore a striped uniform like Bashir had in Auschwitz.

"Need him for what?" Sisko asked, hoping this time they'd be less cryptic.

The Prophet leaned in close to him. They'd never done that before. "You are lost in darkness. Let him be the light."

The light flashed again. The vision was over, and the bacon was burning.

* * *

Ensign Mallory looked up when the captain jumped off the turbolift before it had finished rising. "Sir?"

The captain ignored him and instead ran right to his office. He was the second senior staffer to come up acting strange this morning. Mallory wondered what was going on. He hadn't wanted to bother the doctor when he'd come up and he knew better than bothering the captain when he looked like he did. So Mallory kept his mouth shut and his eyes open. The captain emerged from his office holding a PADD in his hands and Mallory thought it might have been the one the doctor had put in there. Why hadn't they just called each other? It was a bit old fashioned to leave notes. Sisko left again, barking at the turbolift computer to take him to the docking ring.

* * *

Bashir reached the docking ring just as the other passengers were getting on board. There were only a few of them. This was the early shuttle. Not many people were up at this hour, unless they were on duty, in which case, they wouldn't need to be getting on the shuttle. He had his wish, the same wish he'd told his parents when his secret got out. He could leave the station quietly. Only Kira knew, and she didn't know the details. He had a few minutes. He looked out the viewport one last time. The wormhole flared, though no ship had approached it, as if to say goodbye. He turned and stepped into the airlock.

"Doctor!" Sisko's voice stopped him. "Wait!"

He turned and saw Sisko running to meet him. Anger flared in his chest. He couldn't even give up without losing. "You can't stop me," Bashir told him. "You're not my commanding officer anymore."

"Just wait, please," Sisko said, panting.

"What is so important?" Bashir demanded. The shuttle would be leaving soon. He only had a few minutes and this was not how he wanted to be leaving. Kira was the last person he'd wanted to see and he'd seen her. Sisko wasn't supposed to be a part of it.

Sisko caught up to Bashir and stopped to catch his breath. "You are."

Bashir was confused. He dropped his bag to the floor. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means I'm sorry," Sisko said.

"So you've said." Bashir was tired of hearing it. "Sorry doesn't change anything. It doesn't take away what you did to me. It doesn't bring that planet back to life. It doesn't change anything."

"I know that," Sisko said. "But I can't change the past. All we have left is what we do with the future. I'll do better. I can't lose you."

"You lost me a long time ago," Bashir told him. "You lost yourself." But he didn't move away. He waited, though he wasn't sure why.

It was going all wrong. Sisko was here. The shuttle was preparing to leave. Bashir glanced back at the corridor and saw O'Brien stop in the doorway. Kira and Ezri weren't far behind. At least they didn't come in.

"It won't happen again."

"How can you say that?" Bashir threw back at him, not caring now if the others would hear. He was supposed to have left quietly and Sisko had ruined it. "Two weeks from now you'll be busily engaged in the war, plotting this and that and you'll forget all about me. They'll come for me again and you won't even notice I've gone. Just like before." Bashir picked up his bag and turned away. He didn't want to miss the shuttle.

Sisko caught his arm. "Not this time."

Bashir spun around, feeling that familiar fire burning in his chest. "Take your hand off me!" he demanded.

"I can't."

"I resigned!"

"You told me to renew your faith," Sisko reminded him. "Give me the chance."

Sisko's calm voice only infuriated Bashir more. "I gave you a lot of chances!" he spat. "You threw me to the wolves."

Sisko let go of his arm. "I won't force you," he said. "I need you to stay."

Bashir hesitated. Behind him a steward stepped out of the shuttle and called for last boarding. Bashir held a hand up to him. The man nodded. They'd wait a bit longer. "Why are you doing this?" Bashir asked, turning back to Sisko.

"Because I think we've got it all backwards, Julian," Sisko replied, looking him right in the eyes. "I'm not supposed to renew your faith. You're supposed to renew mine."

Bashir glared at him. He didn't get that. He was the one with nothing to believe in. Not Sisko. "I don't want that responsibility."

"The responsibility is mine," Sisko told him. "Stay."

"Why me?" Bashir asked him. He studied Sisko's face as he answered. It was different now. But it was familiar. It was the same face that had met him in Auschwitz, when he'd thought the captain was the changeling. The one that wanted to save him.

Sisko smiled. "Because I have faith in you."

Sisko was acting strangely and Bashir just didn't understand it. He shook his head as he backed away toward the shuttle. "Then you're a fool."

Ezri ran forward at the last moment. "No!" she shouted, but it was too late. Bashir stepped through the door onto the shuttle and the door closed.

**copyright 2002 Gabrielle Lawson**


End file.
